After 10 years in the same starter-size home, my family and I recently ìmoved upî to a larger, more comfortable house.
The two-storey was everything I dreamed of. It contains a large bonus room for my lanky son, and his Lego to stretch out in, large bedrooms, a main floor den and laundry area and more closet-space than I know what to do with.
The crowning glory is the open-concept kitchen with a large island where my husband and I both have enough room to work.
To top it all off, the house is almost brand new and is in a ìswankyî part of Airdrie.
I am not implying my old neighbourhood was a ghetto or anything, but there were a few problems.
I lived on a corner lot backing onto green space - a selling feature when we were shopping for the house. During the day it was wonderful, our backyard twittered with birds and we looked out at the beautifully-landscaped walk-outs situated across the park. When my kids were younger, I could watch them skip across the grass to ride the swings and practice on the monkey bars.
One would think it was the ideal location for our growing kids, situated as it was close to a school and Airdrieís pedestrian overpass.
But therein lies the rub.
At about 8:15 a.m., and 3 p.m. every day, large masses of middle-school-aged kids walked by our house hollering, fighting, weaving across the street and stomping all over my grass.
My kids (and I, if I am honest) learned some new, highly inappropriate words and my front flower bed lost a number of tulips - in full bloom!
At night, gangs of teenagers would hang out in the park, drinking, smoking and carousing on an oversized rock near our backyard.
Thanks to our proximity to a busy street and walking path, we lost a number of bikes, balls and anything else we didnít chain down.
The items were stolen from our front step and our backyard, causing more than a few tears from disappointed pre-schoolers.
Needless to say, I was happy when my husband agreed it was time to move.
We were thrilled with our new neighbourhood.
We are situated on a quiet crescent teeming with school-aged kids that my son quickly befriended.
Our neighbours are quiet and even mowed our front lawn for us - it looked like we had scored.
For the first two months, we kept our windows open and it was so quiet. Sure there was a strange skunky smell drifting into our windows in the evenings, but we felt pretty blessed.
The love affair continued into the fall, when one day while leaving for the office, I noticed a large hole in the neighbourís front door. I called the RCMP as soon as I got to work, concerned about our neighbourís possessions, and later received a call from a nice officer.
ìIt was us,î he said.
The RCMP had received a tip about a possible marijuana grow-op located next door. The concern was later substantiated, when investigators found about $80,000 worth of plants in the basement.
It was a bit unnerving for us. When I asked the officer what I should have been looking for, all the signs were there, but being a country-girl living in the city, I had no idea.
It turns out, when the neighbour mowed our lawn, they were trying to keep us away from their windows. That tinfoil over the windows - it was meant to keep the sun out. Those foggy windows were a result of the high moisture levels.
A co-worker put the way the situation made me feel most eloquently when he jokingly said ìWell Dawn, itís a good thing you moved out of the ëhood to the good side of Airdrie.î
