On The Street Where I Live - 2

In addition to the enchantment of the canopy and arches formed by red maples, our street is also full of human activity.

The Holdup Men

For example, right across from us lives a family of many. The year that we moved in, we saw a police car visit that house often. By spring, I had gotten to know the neighbours a bit. The gossip was, two brothers were under house arrest there. They had attempted to rob a Brinks truck. Sure enough, a month or so later, in our city magazine, there was a story about these brothers with their photograph splashed on the pages. One neighbour in particular swore that photo was of the boys. I was not able to churn the gossip mill to spin even more scandilicous rumour because I had never seen those brothers in person. I should learn from a friend of mine. He maintains that fact has no place in gossip. Spread what you speculate and opine far and wide to fuel more speculation and opinions, otherwise, it's just not good gossip.

The Swap
And in that house, they have a strange living arrangement still to this day. The owner, who must be in his eighties now, lives there most of the year with his second wife. In the summer, the second wife moves out. The man's divorced first wife flies in from Italy and moves in. Apparently, that's their custodial arrangement. The summer was her time to see her children. Only, the children have been adults for as long as we've lived here. I've even seen a few weddings for the "children" of that house. But that summer changeover continues to this day.

The Parking Lot
That same house used to own at least six cars and trucks. Some were just rusty metal in the shape of a car, sitting there for months on end, others covered in plastic. They were using our street as a storage depot. They crowded two, sometimes three cars on their parking pad and took up more than their share of parking spots on the street. The Man complained to the city about all the cars in front of their house. Sure enough, bylaw officers agreed with The Man - they are not allowed to litter the front of their house and the street with broken cars and trucks. They are only allowed one car on their parking pad and they could get at most two parking stickers for the street. The city made them convert one side of their parking pad into a box garden. They had to build a planter on there so they can't use it for parking. One year, they took the planter away. The city came and blocked access to their driveway. Now, they don't have as many cars. Some of the married children have moved away. At least one has bought a house down the street and is parking his cars there instead.

The Tow Truck
And then there is the handicapped sticker on the tow truck. One of the sons from that same house, maybe one of the Brinks robbers, belonged to the lowest of the low sub-specifies of wasted lives. He drove a tow truck. And if that wasn't bad enough, he parked the truck on the street, in front of our house and kept the radio on at night in case he got a call, while he sat inside the house, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes. In the middle of the night, we were often awoken by electronic voices from the truck radio. But just in case we found that acceptable, the tow truck driver also put his father's handicapped sticker on the tow truck so that he could park it anywhere on the street, including in front of our drive so we couldn't get out in the morning.

The Man had been at war with this tow truck for years. He called the police many times on grounds that a tow truck cannot be parked on a residential street overnight, and that a person cannot be a tow truck operator and handicapped at the same time. Because of The Man's persistence, he stimulated action at city hall to crack down on abuse of handicap stickers and the tow truck received parking tickets despite the handicap sticker. As soon as the tow truck parked on the street, The Man would call the police. One time, the tow truck driver's sister, wife or mother came out of their house, crying, shouting and pointing at our house because the police made him drive the tow truck away. "It's them. They always call the police when he comes. He's just parking his truck. He has to earn a living too." What about us getting sleep at night and being able to drive out of our drive way to get to work in the morning? Last I heard, the city took away their handicap sticker. In the last few months, the tow truck hadn't come around. I heard the son had a fight with his father.