An ugly break-up and an empty house

We lost our across-the-street neighbors this week. Actually, they have been lost for awhile. The couple is in the process of getting a divorce; the wife and daughter moved out several months ago. Apparently neither party paid the mortgage so the bank stepped in and foreclosed. What a mess!

This was not a pretty, amicable split. This was more of a “Come around here again and I’ll call the police” break-up.

I remember a St Patrick’s Day evening about two years ago. A storm had knocked out power in our section of town, so we were sitting around the candle-lit house. There was a knock at the door and the wife, “Joan”, practically fell through the door. She was quite drunk and her clothes were askew. She said that her husband, “Sam,” had hit her.

Mrs. Poolman tended to Joan, while I went to find Sam, who was also quite drunk. He denied hitting Joan and said she was the one hitting him until he pushed her away and she fell down.

The “discussion” flowed back and forth across the street. Eventually, Sam’s mom and step-dad showed up, along with Sam and Joan’s 11-year old daughter. We all tried to get Sam to go home with his Mom, just to get the fighting couple separated until they sobered up. Sam went back to his bedroom; got into bed; and refused to budge while his mother screamed at him.

In the middle of all this, a major thunderstorm broke out. I have jokingly described the entire episode as a Jerry Springer Show stuck in the middle of a Stephen King novel.

I don’t feel terribly sorry for the couple. They made their own bed. However, I do feel for their now-13 year old daughter. She deserves better than that.

Our hope now is the house moves quickly, and we get a good set of neighbors across the street. Fingers crossed.

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