Does Anyone Admit to Being the Crazy Neighbor?

I won’t admit that I was the crazy neighbor. However, I will admit that my neighbors probably thought I was crazy or at least eccentric. For example, on one day, I was about to take the Babies out for a walk to the park. I was at the door putting my shoes on and about to put the leashes on the Babies. I must say now that people talking on one side of those condo doors can be clearly heard on the other side as if the door wasn’t there at all. Fortunately, the noises from the hall dissipate rapidly on going from the hall to the living room and vice versa.

Unfortunately for me, I was standing right beside the door so if anyone was on the other side, my voice could be easily and clearly heard by someone else.  I was chattering to the Babies as if they could understand everything I said—like they were people. I was probably telling them how much I loved them or how pretty they were. Of course I was using the tone one would use for addressing babies, real human babies. I should also note that anyone who lived in that building for a while knew that I lived alone. So, if anyone outside of my door heard me talking, that person would know that I was not talking to another person.

After I said what I had to say to the Babies and put the leashes on them, I swung the door open. A couple from the other end of the first floor was walking down the hall near my door. In unison, they moved their eyes from my door to a spot on the floor several feet in front of them. They kept walking by deliberately avoiding eye contact with me and locking there stare at some invisible spot on the ground. Their avoidance was obvious. The guy did smirk a little.

I knew what they were thinking. They thought I was crazy as hell. Their amusement was palpable, too. They knew I lived alone and that I was talking at length to no one but my dogs. I’ve had those awkward feelings myself with people who were not quite all there. We all have, such as with the really smelly guy on a bus or a park bench talking at length to a phantom conjured up in his head. You want to look, know you shouldn’t but you do anyway.

I think that is how my neighbors felt on that awkward afternoon several years ago. They were eavesdropping on someone’s privacy and were quite entertained by it until they got caught. One doesn’t have to be a mind reader to know that they thought I was at least a little weird or even a little crazy. I lala’d my Babies a whole lot and didn’t give a shit who knew.