People are funny. Some people are funny, in the sense they are full of mirth, while others are funny, as in odd, strange, and curious. Several years ago, when David and I were looking at places to re-locate from our long time home, we arrived at the house we would ultimately buy. The owners of the house were a 96 year old woman and her 75 year old daughter. The daughter had a melancholy demeanor, exacerbated by her consumption of mass quantities of cheap wine beginning early in the day. When I walked into the kitchen for the first time, I gazed out the window toward the lovely view of the golf course (the house is located on the 9th fairway), only to be informed by the home owner that the golfers were terrible. She then began to regale me with one account after another of all the rude, nasty, piggish things she had witnessed the golfers doing over the many years she had lived in the house. Needless to say, both her and David’s and my real estate agents were aghast! I, on the other hand, thought it was quite revealing to be told that owning a home situated on a golf course would mean there would be golfers present, on a daily basis, in the park like area behind the back yard that comprises the golf course. Of course there are golfers playing golf on a golf course! It’s a golf course! David and I have had our fair share of problems with the golfers, including public urination (ick!), trespassing to retrieve errant golf balls, lots and lots of yelling foul language, and smelly cigar smoke, but overall, it is worth a few minor inconveniences to be able to enjoy our lovely view. Why would anyone move to a house on a golf course, only to complain about people playing golf? Why would anyone move near an airport, then complain about noise from airplanes? Why would anyone move near a hospital, then complain about ambulance sirens? Why would anyone move near a waste treatment facility, then complain about the smell? I guess some people will complain about anything! My advice: Don’t move to the beach then complain about the sand in your shoes!
Fortunately, Melissa and I have the ability to laugh at things like the experience with the seller of our home saying she hated the golfers. (For that matter, she told us, wine in hand at 2:00 p.m., that she hated the house…) We have also looked at houses and had the ability to consider “environmental” reasons to look beyond that house. The house on the lake with a view of a trash mountain (which had the highest elevation in Broward County of any other land). We noticed a smell and asked the owner about it – he said something to the effect that he didn’t notice it, any more. Then there was the house in the flight line of the main runway at the Ft. Lauderdale airport. While I enjoyed watching the planes arrive for the time I was at the house, for an hour or less, it quickly dawned on us that the noise would be too much (not that, in Broward, one can ever seem to get too far from one of the 4 or 5 airports – we’ve lived near 2 of them). My most humorous encounter of this sort, beyond the golfers, was hearing an elderly New Yorker who had retired to Florida complaining about the heat and humidity in a very dramatic fashion. I mean, what was she expecting??? A snow storm? Sometimes, you have to take the good with the bad. For me, golf ball collecting is a new hobby.
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