I assumed you were speaking in support of ShadiRoxan, not in opposition to her, as she is your SO. As you know, it’s not customary for couples to air their differences on the board. Therefore, in my reply, I was addressing the both of you as a unit.
I’m sure you didn’t intend to sound like you were criticizing your wife about her handling of this matter, but it does sound like you’re doing just that.
Perhaps you or your wife ought to request that this thread be closed down.
Heh. I’m memorable!
Well, the reason I put it so bluntly in my suggested paragraph is this: some people Just Don’t Get It. Some people have emotional or mental problems, there are people all over the Functional Autistic spectrum, there are people with genuine inability to read expressions, tone of voice. There are people who cannot take the hints that you and I might hear loud and clear. There are people you simply must use the very exact words to express the very exact meaning you require them to understand.
Now, perhaps the lady in question lives in a kind of false reality that anyone who doesn’t openly hate her, actively likes her. There are people like that. ShadiRoxen’s husband apparently is able to get across the ‘I don’t like you’ vibe in a manner that this neighbor can understand. Or perhaps the neighbor doesn’t feel comfortable being visity with a male neighbor. Or just finds nothing in common with him, and doesn’t care to hang around him. I can think of a lot of variations on why this might be true - and they don’t all involve the neighbor possessing a fine-honed ability to read body language, etc.
In my own life…I had a friend. At least I thought she was my friend, for about a year. Anyway, she got involved in selling Mary Kay at a time of family financial crisis, and over the course of a month or two she became less friendly and more businesslike on the phone with me. I called her perhaps once a week. And then one day she said bluntly, “I don’t have time to be your friend.” That was the last she ever spoke to me. I still don’t understand what happened, and I’m left wondering if that was the truth. But at least I was left with no misundersatnding: she didn’t want to be my friend, and she was not my friend. The end. Did it hurt? Yes. Am I still confused? Yes. BUT there is no question about whether a relationship exists any longer. I also know it can be survived, and this neighbor lady won’t die of embarrassment or hurt feelings.
I, too, am under the impression that this is a personal matter that should be worked out together at home, not on a public message board. For this reason, I am going to lock off this thread.