No good deed goes unpunished

I'm generally regarded as an easy going person. Ask any person who knows me moderately well and they'll probably describe me as fairly easy going. It helps if you ask them a leading question about how easy going I am. Unfortunately, like most human beings, I can sort of be a pain in the ass when angered. I blame it on adrenaline and testosterone. I'm fairly certain I'd be a very peaceable woman, but that's neither here nor there. I was, a bit irked at receiving a hand scrawled note from our neighbor, and I immediately called and left a bit of an angry message on the answering machine pointing out the misinformation they'd presented in the letter and accusing them of not actually calling our phones and the like. Message below:

1) I received your piece of paper, and I can only assume that would prefer to solve it in the traditional manner, a duel at high noon. If you would like to recuse yourself from this duty due to old age I will accept a formal apology in the form of an egg McMuffin.

2) Hi, this is your neighbor Andrew over at Oneida Place, and I just wanted to make you aware that I've released an entire bee hive in your house. I think they've gotten into the walls, and I just thought you should know before you went in there.

3) Hi, this is your neighbor over at Oneida Place. I wanted to let you know that we've gone ahead and torn down your fence and replaced it with a piece of Modern Art made entirely from construction paper and Elmer's glue. I really think you're going to like it!

4) Hi, this is your neighbor over at Oneide Place. I received your message the other day. I wanted to let you know that I was in good spirits that day, until I read your note. And I'm in kind of a down mood now, and I suppose that's why I've just returned from your house after smashing all the windows and throwing candy in your living room. I wanted your house to feel like an open pinata when you got back, but I suppose a person could come home to a thing like that and call it vandalism. You say potato I say, leave me the hel- alone.

After leaving my fairly bitter message I waited a few days to receive a call from my erstwhile neighbor, letting my anger build to righteous indignation. And that's when I received a call from Ava, who apologized for the misunderstanding about the dirt in the alley, and said she was sorry that she couldn't make it to the house more often because she is currently trying to take care of her very sick husband. And, as it turns out, I am just some jerk on the phone now trying to back pedal my way into just being a neighborly sort of fellow and hoping that the rumors of her slight dementia are true, and that she'll forget the whole irritated phone message incident altogether. This is what I get for my biannual public blow up. Maybe if I lost it more often I'd feel less guilty. That's probably the lesson to be learned here isn't it?