When I lived in Brownfield, ME I had a great apartment on the ground floor, right under the apartment of a woman with three children, who may have also taken in a few kids for day care. I wrote the following vignette about the experience:
Living in the country
I moved from the glittery, clap-trap, honky-tonk enclaves of North Conway, New Hampshire out to the tranquil fens of Brownfield Maine - brown grasses, white birch and white pine...
Imagine my surprise when, unexpectedly, a bowling ball rolls across the floor of the upstairs apartment. Rolled by erratic spastic weight lifters unaware of their deafening strength.The upstairs, I later find, is inhabited by three children. Lovely lively maniacal children. No I am sure there must be 300 children at least. Each weights 500 pounds, no 50,000 pounds. They carry bricks in their pockets and wear lead shoes. They play tackle football for hours on end, scurrying with vibratory clatter and crash through every room. Not one square inch of ceiling is safe. No room is quiet.
My nerves have reached a degree of raw reserved for the uncooked and freshly slaughtered. My cat tears out his hair in clumps. Why did I come here? Oh yes, the tranquil country life....
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I'd come home from work and have to coax my cat of those years, Jacklee out from under the couch. Other odd things happened. One day I shoveled out the litter box, putting the offending debris into a paper bag and carefully folded the the top down to seal it. I put this bag of treasure out on the little deck by the front door, meaning to carry it to the dumpster. I forgot to. When I came home from work it was gone. I can only imagine little hands unrolling the bag and well - ick
