when the red sox won (home)
Oct. 7th, 2003 09:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
adrian_turtleLast night I heard the screaming. Loud voices across the
hall, when I was brushing my teeth before bed. I turned off
the water and went to the door to listen. Screaming, cursing,
a few impact noises.
I wasn't sure how much of it was from the tv...but at least one
of the screams was my neighbor's voice. And some of the impacts
sounded like skin against skin. I pulled on a pair of jeans over
my pajamas. After I opened the door, I just stood there in the
hallway feeling uncomfortable.
Were they screaming at each other, or the tv? In anger
or in play? Were those impact noises applause? Fighting?
Playing? I couldn't tell. I hesitated to intrude. The
sound of breaking glass convinced me to Do Something. That,
even if there was no need for immediate rescue, the situation
would not seem to be innocent and under control, if some
hypothetical reasonable person were listening to it....not
that I imagined there was a reasonable person anywhere in
the hallway. (And I was immediately ashamed of myself for
feeling more motivated, more justified, by the sound of a
glass breaking than a woman screaming.) Even so, I waited
for the footsteps on the stairs to reach the top.
The downstairs neighbor wasn't worried, like I was...he was
just angry about the noise. He knocked and complained.
My across-the-hall neighbor's loud boyfriend (her BIG loud
boyfriend) explained about the Red Sox, and apologized for
the noise. Both in a rather drunken muddle. I stood there
like a lump in my bare feet. There was no apparent need to
rescue anyone. (Or at least none that could be detected from
background noise last night.)
This is SO embarrassing. I had known there was a problem with
the thin wall that has my bed on one side, and the next-door
neighbor's piano on the other. But I hadn't realized sound
traveled so easily across the hall. And through the floor.
I value my privacy. I like to think my neighbors value theirs
similarly, but that's a dangerous assumption.
There are two fundamentally different approaches to privacy
(maybe more. I'm familiar with these.) You can make private
stuff impossible to perceive. For as long as that works. Or
you can let it be perceptible, but trust people to pretend not
to notice what is none of their business. The latter approach
requires some consensus about "none of their business," and I
don't know what the rules are among my neighbors. If my neighbor
wanted to bring home a different lover every night and play rough
with him (or play the piano with him, for that matter), I'd want
to consider that private. Except maybe piano-playing late at night.
It's hard enough to judge when a dear friend's relationship is
slipping from unhappiness towards abuse, or from abuse towards
imminent danger. How can you judge, what can you do, with someone
who is only a little bit closer than a stranger?
I want to put a pillow over my head. Next time I have an
overnight guest (as my former housemate put it, "a VERY
social call"), I probably will.
hall, when I was brushing my teeth before bed. I turned off
the water and went to the door to listen. Screaming, cursing,
a few impact noises.
I wasn't sure how much of it was from the tv...but at least one
of the screams was my neighbor's voice. And some of the impacts
sounded like skin against skin. I pulled on a pair of jeans over
my pajamas. After I opened the door, I just stood there in the
hallway feeling uncomfortable.
Were they screaming at each other, or the tv? In anger
or in play? Were those impact noises applause? Fighting?
Playing? I couldn't tell. I hesitated to intrude. The
sound of breaking glass convinced me to Do Something. That,
even if there was no need for immediate rescue, the situation
would not seem to be innocent and under control, if some
hypothetical reasonable person were listening to it....not
that I imagined there was a reasonable person anywhere in
the hallway. (And I was immediately ashamed of myself for
feeling more motivated, more justified, by the sound of a
glass breaking than a woman screaming.) Even so, I waited
for the footsteps on the stairs to reach the top.
The downstairs neighbor wasn't worried, like I was...he was
just angry about the noise. He knocked and complained.
My across-the-hall neighbor's loud boyfriend (her BIG loud
boyfriend) explained about the Red Sox, and apologized for
the noise. Both in a rather drunken muddle. I stood there
like a lump in my bare feet. There was no apparent need to
rescue anyone. (Or at least none that could be detected from
background noise last night.)
This is SO embarrassing. I had known there was a problem with
the thin wall that has my bed on one side, and the next-door
neighbor's piano on the other. But I hadn't realized sound
traveled so easily across the hall. And through the floor.
I value my privacy. I like to think my neighbors value theirs
similarly, but that's a dangerous assumption.
There are two fundamentally different approaches to privacy
(maybe more. I'm familiar with these.) You can make private
stuff impossible to perceive. For as long as that works. Or
you can let it be perceptible, but trust people to pretend not
to notice what is none of their business. The latter approach
requires some consensus about "none of their business," and I
don't know what the rules are among my neighbors. If my neighbor
wanted to bring home a different lover every night and play rough
with him (or play the piano with him, for that matter), I'd want
to consider that private. Except maybe piano-playing late at night.
It's hard enough to judge when a dear friend's relationship is
slipping from unhappiness towards abuse, or from abuse towards
imminent danger. How can you judge, what can you do, with someone
who is only a little bit closer than a stranger?
I want to put a pillow over my head. Next time I have an
overnight guest (as my former housemate put it, "a VERY
social call"), I probably will.
