“Move that truck, or I’m calling the police!” Brenda Whitmore shouted across my driveway.
I had a length of pine balanced against my shoulder and a box of deck screws tucked beneath my other arm.
The truck was mine, the lumber was mine, and the concrete under my boots was part of a driveway I had repaired three weeks earlier.
Brenda stood at the property line in a crisp white blouse, gripping a folder against her chest as though it were a court order.
“This is my driveway, Brenda,” I said.
“Your property is inside Maple Ridge Estates, and you follow our rules.”
“I’m not under your HOA.”
She made a little sound that might have been a laugh if it had contained any amusement.
“Everybody on this street answers to me.”
Her confidence had become familiar during the six weeks since I moved into the house at the corner of Ash Lane.
First came a polite welcome letter addressed to the resident, demanding a monthly association payment.
Then came a notice about the color of my truck, which was apparently too commercial for her vision of a respectable neighborhood.
The third notice warned that I could be fined for storing lumber where a passing motorist might see it.
I had returned every envelope unopened because I knew precisely what the documents recorded at the county courthouse said.
Unfortunately, I had made the mistake of assuming that everybody else had the same information.
“I’m giving you one last opportunity,” Brenda told me.
“You’re standing on the edge of my flower bed,” I replied.
She stepped forward instead of back and dialed her phone.
“I’d like an officer sent to Ash Lane because a noncompliant homeowner is threatening our association,” she said brightly.
I placed my lumber on two sawhorses and took out my own phone.
The police car arrived twelve minutes later, slowly enough that I could see two elderly neighbors watching from their windows.
Officer Lena Brooks listened while Brenda offered a dramatic account of my supposed intimidation.
Brenda waved six yellow violation notices and described the truck as a commercial vehicle illegally parked on private association land.
Officer Brooks looked at the vehicle, then at the driveway, and asked whether either of us had threatened bodily harm.
“He refuses my lawful directives,” Brenda answered.
“That’s not what I asked,” the officer said.
I handed her my identification and explained that my truck had remained within my surveyed lot.
