Duplex

The house we live in is a sort of duplex, but instead of being beside each other, the units are perpendicular to each other. The Hubby and I think this was one big house before, and the owners just put up a wall in the middle (which explains why there are weird pillars in the middle of nowhere in our dining and living rooms).

The entire building is on a corner lot, so we have separate entrances. Even our street addresses are different. On our side of the street, it still looks like one huge house. Their floor-to-ceiling window is on our side of the yard. When we moved in, it freaked me out because I thought there was a mystery window that you can't see from inside the the house--with people that you can only see from the outside. Now the neighbors keep their blinds closed.

I think we have the better layout though. Our front is a small yard and garage, and our service area is in the back (so we don't have to air our dirty linen in public). The neighbor's service area, however, is an extension of their garage. If you walk by their street, you can see their laundry hanging in the garage. Not ideal. Imagine all the exhaust on fresh laundry!

And speaking of laundry, since our service areas are separated only by a cement wall about eight feet high, we can pretty much hear everything going on in each other's service areas. Which means, since we do laundry at the same time, we can hear when one's spin cycle ends and so on. Which means that I can hear all the music they play on their side of the world.

First on their laundry playlist is some good old Star FM. But thankfully, this is just the warm up. Soon they move on to classic Air Supply. Now I admit to growing up with Air Supply. So I know that there are two less lonely people in the world, and that you can make love out of nothing at all. After the entire Air Supply concert series, they start to play Bob Dylan reminiscing about this house on in New Orleans, that they called the rising sun. Next, Rainbow tells of how one day in the year of the fox, there was this guy searching, seeking, and he ends up in the temple of the king. Then the grand finale: Tom Jones wailing why, why, why Delilah.

This is their playlist. Every. Single. Week. I can tell how far along their laundry they are by what song is playing. I tried playing my own music, but my musical posse always gets drowned out. I once briefly considered going over to ask them to tone down their music, or at least change it. I thought of sending over a paper plane with a note made of letters torn out from different papers, ransom style, "If you know what's good for you, you will cease to play such music..."

Finally, one Sunday, I couldn't stand it. I just couldn't.

I started singing along. Forgive me Delilah, I just couldn't take anymore.