Westchester Has Turned Me Into a Jonathan Franzen Character

So I yelled at an old man.

Yup, I've finally gone off the deep end.

Remember those snowpiles I mentioned a few posts back? Well, we've had those piles of snow on either sides of our driveway since December 16!

Yes, that's SINCE LAST YEAR people!!

And when I went over to the neighbor across the street to ask him to please stop pushing all of his snow to our side of the street, he responded by saying:

"Well, where else should I put it?"

Uhm...oh, I don't know...maybe YOUR side of the street? Maybe YOUR backyard you big DOUCHE? How about I hire a crew to stuff it all up your pooper?

So a few days ago it snowed again and I was sick of it. I spent two hours digging out the snow and putting the snow on HIS side of the street. Then, a window went up in the house and an old man shouted at me. He said:

"Why are you putting all your snow on our side of the street? How am I supposed to drive over all that snow when I get out of my spot?"

I look over at him and I throw down my shovel and point at the HUGE piles of snow on my side of the street. And then I proceed to scream at this extremely old man:

"Do you SEE the HUGE PILES of snow on our side of the street? YOUR LANDLORD has been doing this to us ALL WINTER! Well, it's not cool, is it? I'm totally SICK OF IT and we don't get any sun on our side of the street so the snow DOESN'T MELT. If I put the snow on your side of the street it will melt by tomorrow! WE HAVEN'T BEEN ABLE TO PULL IN AND OUT OF OUR DRIVEWAY SINCE DECEMBER 16TH! And what are you talking about? That's NOT EVEN YOUR CAR parked next to that snow!"

Yes, not my best moment.

Then the landlord opens his door and just stands there staring at me with his hands on his hips. I mean, it was really weird. I thought, you know, if this was a movie, he would come out here and help me with the snow. I thought he was going to come out and talk to me, but no...he just spent the next half-hour watching me shovel snow.

When I told my friend about this, she said, "Oh, dear. You HAVE TO move back into the city. You've just turned into a Jonathan Franzen character."

And I was all, "Duuuuude. I'm turning into Patty Berglund."

Of course, as soon as I yelled at the old man, I stopped pushing the snow to their side of the street. I was a bit embarrassed because I knew that even though our neighbor was being a total douche, I shouldn't have escalated it. In fact, when I told Peter about it, he was all:

"Are you okay?"

As in, do we need to send you to a mental hospital to calm down?

I am just so sick of my stupid note-leaving neighbors who are so crotchety and awful and do douchey things. But on the bright side, when the neighbor cleaned out the snow in his driveway, he didn't push it all against our side of the street this time...so maybe my crazy rant wasn't for nothing after all.