By: Angela Gillaspie © February 2001

I have a fulfilling life working at home with my three children aged 9, 7, and 4. I program the computer - they fight, I cook - they fight, I read to them - they fight.

Bliss.

During the spring of 2001, new folks moved in our neighborhood and now the street teems with boys aged four to eight. More often than not, all kids end up in my backyard because it has a trampoline and large fort with a slide and swing set.

There are times my workload is heavier than usual, and I can't handle watching and refereeing everyone's kids, so I try subtle ways to deter the neighborhood boys from coming over. Once, I latched and locked both gates on my fence.

Soon I look up from my computer screen and see two or three kids (that don't belong to me) jumping on the trampoline and hanging upside down on the fort. Apparently they scaled my five-foot fence.

I have to take precautions with the doors to our house too, because if they aren't locked, the neighborhood boys will saunter in and make themselves at home. One time while washing dishes, I heard a strange noise.

Drying my hands on a towel, I noticed the open front door and then saw one of the four-year-old neighborhood boys walking out of my bathroom hitching up his pants. He grinned and walked out the door - never looking back. Grass clippings led the way into the bathroom where I found urine sprinkled all over the floor and bathroom seat.

When summer arrived, so did the neighborhood kids (and all of their cousins, half-brothers, and best friends). Sometimes as early as 7:30 in the morning, children were ringing my doorbell or smashing their faces against my deck windows looking into my dining room.

Peeking through a cracked door, I politely suggest, "My kids are not up yet; they'll be out to play later."

The neighborhood boys tried to push past me and come in. Planting my foot and hip in the way, (and still trying to smile sweetly), I said, "The kids are ASLEEP, and you CAN'T come in."

"OK, we'll wait here until they get up," they replied.

So they sat outside of the door, peeking between the mini-blinds.

When my kids got up, dressed, and ate, they ran outside to play. The neighborhood boys played in my yard until after seven at night, going home only once or twice for bathroom and lunch breaks (I locked the doors). I normally looked forward to summer, but after the first week of summer break, I am ready to either move or build a 20-foot alligator-filled moat.

Let me paint a picture. Imagine you're on the phone with an accountant and he's detailing how his Labor Cost Run bombed. Propping the phone against your ear, you start the software to dial into the mainframe so that you can look at the hexadecimal dump. Your oldest son blasts through the door and tearfully tells you that so-and-so shoved him. When you peek outside, you see SIX children wrestling on the trampoline. Your call-waiting-caller-id alerts you that yet another accountant is on the line from a different plant with a different problem, and you stupidly stare at the computer screen for some clue to what you were first doing.

No, I'm not exaggerating.

Where are the parents? Once while checking the mail, I noticed an adult I had never met before walking quickly to the house where many of these children came from during the day. Using deductive reasoning, I figured she was a parent. I introduced myself and she brightened and said, "The kids just love playing at your house! Bye now!"

Slam.

She ran inside before I could say anything else. As I raised my hand to knock, I heard her latch three deadbolts.

Everyone has a different way of parenting, and she must go by the kids-are-better-not-seen-and-not-heard-and-better-playing-at-the-nice-neighbor-lady's-house type.

My husband and I have been talking and we've agreed on a plan: We're going to move.

If we can just keep the neighborhood boys from pulling up the "For Sale" sign and from scaring off potential buyers, we'll be out of here before summer. And then I can get back to my normal life of working at home and being Mommy to my three kids without getting the feeling that someone is staring at me through my dining room window.

Stay tuned for more of Southern Angel's "moving" momma stories!