Good Fences Make Good Neighbours?

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall…” – Robert Frost ‘Mending Wall’

I remember Late Mrs. Ezeoke (God bless her soul), our English Literature teacher in secondary school teaching and analysing this poem in class. I really loved Literature, guess that was the reason why I studied English language and Literature in the University (okay, that and the fact that I didn’t make the JAMB cut-off mark required to study Law).

In summary, the poem is about two neighbours who meet every Spring to carry out repairs on the fence that demarcates their compounds. One neighbour is of the opinion that they don’t need the fence as neither of them has cows that’d enter the other’s compound and cause damages; afterall all they have are pine and apple trees. The second neighbour on the other hand insists that the fence is important for peace to be maintained and boundaries not to be crossed, as according to him, ‘good fences make good neighbours’.

In the society we live in, especially in the cities, neighbours don’t even need a fence to avoid each other. One could live in the same compound and not know the name of his/her next door neighbour. Everybody minds his/her business. For people like me that grew up in a village in the East where everybody knew everybody, it was a bit difficult adjusting when I moved to Abuja 10 years ago. However, with time, I learnt that not everybody had the same background as I did. Some actually see it as disturbance when you try to be friendly or just drop in for a friendly neighbourly visit and chit-chat. Na wa!!

Last week, two incidents made me re-examine how neighbourly we’re being in this part of the country. I heard a horrific story of a young woman who died and decomposed in her flat, and nobody knew for days. She didn’t go to work for about a week, didn’t come out of her flat for days and no one noticed! It took her friend and colleague who travelled out of town to come back and check on her after she called and called and didn’t get through. She went to the lady’s house, met her backdoor open, walked in and saw her friend’s decomposing body, complete with maggots!!! Can you imagine the horror???!! I can’t even begin to imagine that!! The security man actually said the woman was indoors as her car was parked in the usual parking space. The friend that discovered the body said the stench coming from her flat was unimaginable; you know what the neighbours said? That they thought a rat had died!!! Whaatt??!!! Terrible! Her colleagues didn’t see her for about a week and nobody thought to check on her as there might be something wrong?? Whatever happens to being our brother’s keeper?

The second story was that of a seemingly successful young black brother who moved into my friend’s compound. He came and went as he pleased, kept to himself. Hardly came out for communal meetings, paid whatever levy was demanded of him. This continued till days ago when the Special Anti-Robbery Squad of the Nigerian Police stormed their compound looking for him! Lo and behold, our fine, quiet, brother is a big-time car thief!!! They’d snatch a car, send the car to a panel-beater who’d change things in the car, and they’d sell! Apparently they snatched an SUV with a powerful tracker, which was used to track the car to the panel-beater’s who then brought the Police to his “oga’s” place. Hmmm… imagine the shock of the neighbours.

Courtesy: thegreatdoodle.blogspot.com

This brings about my question: how well do we know our neighbours? We get the need for privacy in this modern age, but remember, if anything happens to you, the person that’d come to your aid first could be that neighbour you don’t talk to. What kind of a neighbour are you? The uncooperative, quarrelsome and cantankerous one? The one who will never agree with everybody, and who always causes problems in the compound? Are you the type of neighbour that your neighbours will call to know how you’re doing if they don’t see you for a day or two? Or the type they’d scheme and pray he/she moves out and leaves them in peace? I believe that ‘something there is that doesn’t love a wall’. We can be friendly neighbours and still maintain boundaries. The woman that died wasn’t missed by her neighbours. Even when they thought a rat died, nobody bothered to check on her to know if the kain rat died in her house, or even to ask her if she could smell the dead animal. Remember, no man is an island, I don’t know what you’re “walling in or walling out”, but I do know that we need each other. That neighbour you look down on could be the one that’ll save you when armed robbers come to your place.

Can we get to know our neighbours better? And can we also let other people know us better?

Have a blessed week ahead!

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