Photo Credit: Brick Underground.
My neighbour two doors down is driving me crazy. I’m in my apartment and I can hear her clearing her throat. It’s not a discrete, polite, lady-like little ahem. It’s a disgusting, back of the throat where your nasal cavities empty, where all that nasty, phlegmy stuff gathers, guttural hocking sound, as when you hock a loogy. It’s the kind of sound men make when they’re outdoors and feel anonymous enough to spit the end product out onto the street. Except she’s a woman who’s indoors. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not sexist. It’s just as disgusting when men do it. The main reason this causes a problem for me is because she insists on leaving her apartment door open at all times. This is one of her quirks, and we all have them, but this one turns her private space into a public one that affects every other resident on this floor. I also hear her TV, her conversations and her alarm go off every time she needs help from a PSW.
And I hear it all. Did I mention I’m probably the only resident in this place that has normal hearing? It’s a mixed blessing, especially in communal living.
That’s my left ear. In the right one, I hear my next-door neighbour’s TV. Tonight, she and a friend are watching and laughing at some British comedies. This is music to my ears. Sometimes it’s just too damn loud. She told me the young salesman dude at the store convinced her she needed one more speaker. He was wrong. I also hear her coughing, day and night. She probably doesn’t even realize she coughs as much as she does.
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