There's a Scrooge on Every Street

Every Christmas for the past eight years that we've lived here, our neighbor on the corner of our street tosses out her holiday lights. And I do mean tosses out. One strand of multi-colored lights are thrown onto the lawn near her front door. However they land is the way they stay for the week before Christmas and the week after.

And why did she start doing that? Here's the story, as I've heard it from our neighbors who've lived on this street much longer than we have:

Our beautiful little street is a cul de sac, with just 15 houses. Years and years ago, when all of these homes were owned by the original buyers, someone on the street decided that instead of different colored Christmas lights all over the houses, it would be nicer if everyone in all of the 15 homes here would put up just white lights for the holiday. (Outside lights, to be exact. What you wanted to do inside was another story, but the theme would be tiny white lights for the outside.)

And that's what everyone did... white lights for the bushes and trees and porches on all the 15 houses, plus red bows on all the mailboxes. Pardon me... did I say 15 houses? Make that 14. The people who lived in the corner house didn't want to join the white-light program. They wanted to string up multi-colored lights and they did. One of the other 14 home-owners went to the corner house, knocked on the door and asked if they would rather put up white lights so the entire street would have the same elegant look.

Legend has it that the owner of that corner house wanted no part of white lights, wanted no part of anyone's theme, and wanted the neighbor to get away from her front door. The multi-colored lights stayed put that year on the corner house. The following Christmas, as the other 14 houses were decked out with white lights again, the corner house had the multi-colored lights... but they weren't put up on the house, they were just tossed out onto the front lawn.

And that's what that woman has done ever since. The only exception is that in the past 10 years or so, she's just taken to tossing out one strand of colored lights, rather than a dozen or so strands. One December night, about 5 or 6 years ago, the woman in that corner house came out to plug in her one strand of lights and instead of finding the multi-colored glow on her lawn, the lights had been decoratively arranged on the large azaela bush near her front door. Needless to say, she was not amused and proceeded to tear the strand of lights off of the azaela, taking half of its blooms off along with the lights. We never did find out just who rearranged those lights...

My husband went to his office for a couple of hours this afternoon, and as he walked in the front door this evening, he said: "Well, Christmas has officially begun." I took one look at the smirk on his face and said: "Let me guess. S has tossed out her Christmas lights?" "Correct," said he.

Thus began a discussion about how best to spread a little Christmas cheer to our totally cheerless corner neighbors. No matter what we came up with, we knew that nothing would work. S has made it clear to just about everyone on the street that she doesn't wish to be friendly. Apparently, she never heard the Texas rule: "There are no strangers in Texas... just friends who haven't yet met." Not only is S not interested in meeting anyone, she does her best to avoid eye contact with everyone else on the street. And probably the planet as well.

Everyone here has just about given up. Lord knows we've all tried. But honestly, how many times can you say "Good morning" to someone who looks the other way?

My one wish..... Wouldn't it be great if all the people on this street got together at 3:00 in the morning and decorated her entire house with white Christmas lights... then the following evening, when S comes out of her front door to plug in her one strand of lights, her whole house would be glowing bright enough to outshine the landing lights at Hobby Airport.

But that probably won't ever happen....... Sure would be nice, though. What really needs to happen is for a four or five-year-old child to go up and ring S's doorbell..... and ask her why there's a string of lights jumbled up on her front lawn. Honestly now-- how could even S look into the innocent eyes of a child and find a reasonable answer to that?