Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Helping your Neighbors

It gives such a good feeling when you are able to give of oneself to help another. Growing up on the Farm, the philosophy was "If you can help someone and it doesn't hurt you, Do It." A famer neighbor had a heart attack and died unexpectant one night and had 2 large hayfields mowed. My Dad said go rake it (I think I was 13) and then we baled it all and put it in the barn for them. He did not ask, just did it. There were a number of other times we did such things for a neighbor in need. Where I live now, I often plow all my neighbors driveways in the Winter if we have heavy snow. I don't ask, I just do it as I have the equipment and they don't. Plus, they still work and I am retired. I am sure it is nice coming home to a plowed driveway after working all day. I am sure many of the fine Gents on this Board do likewise for their neighbors. I can sense that from the posts you all make. But is that type of thing dying in todays society? Are we becoming more self centered and less "neighborly", more about the me and not us ? I truly don't know the answer to that question hence this post. I am often amazed when talking to someone that they don't know their neighbors after living there for a number of years. Is Life today so fast and involved that we don't have time for helping others?

Mainly, people just get on my damn nerves. Fugk 'em.

^^^^^^

plus I found out my neighbors wife voted for sleepyJ. I reiterate… phug em

I share our garden produce with neighbors. I usually turn and disc on neighbor's garden as he doesn't own a tractor. I do not do things on someone else's property without first asking for permission or being asked. Some folks prefer to be left alone.

I don’t have much contact with my neighbors now. My ex wife’s parents were next door until they died off. I did a lot for them even though their daughter and I were divorced. That caused some problems at first with her, but she came to appreciate it as time went by. She called my wife when she couldn’t get her mom one morning. Wifey found her on the kitchen floor, live d to 91, healthy as a horse until the day she died.

I could make an awesome thread too patting myself on the back for the many times I’ve cock-blocked a tree service scumball outfit from charging old ladies $thousand$ for dropping and hauling out LARGE trees near farm and homesteads. Not necessarily random neighbors by geography but by identified community need and church family.

Fall in a few Saturdays with World Changers and roof some folks’ houses, forego your Paladin and Walter Brennan Saturday at the Bijou with Charlie Chan and get back to me.

Crawl under a 1ft clearance crawlspace and treat an 80 year old widow’s home for subterranean termites

LOL

We live in a rural area where neighbors help neighbors all the time. But it seems tragedy is what has to bring it out now. We live in place where, during the floods in 2016, literally most in my parish were homeless, yet we seem to all gain weight! LOL. Meals were cooked, we shared our sorrows and whatever we had to help each other as well.

I have a fantastic neighbor, when he sees me struggling with something in the yard he usually walks over with two beers and ask "what are we working on?"

I think electronics as replaced real intimacy amongst people.
It's like we are all living someone else's life and that life is fake to begin with.

One of the reasons the Good Lord put us here.

My neighborhood I'm surrounded by widow women and divorcees. Nearly every day I'm asked to do some minor honey-do for someone. Last week was a new irrigation timer and circuit box issues. I don't usually mind, I'm retired.

I grew up the same as you.

We helped everyone and treated them like family.

But right now, I could only tell you a few of my neighbors names.

And most of them, I don't like anyway. Especially the governor. She thinks she rules the whole neighborhood and everyone has to do what she says and just sits and stalks and harasses and is as two faced as it comes.

That doesn't fly with me and why we don't get along. I made it very clear to her where her side of the road was. And she's made it pure hell ever since. I can't wait until that old bat dies. Instead of flowers, I'm going to send a single drop of water to her funeral because I know where she's going, she can't have it.

80 yr old neighbor tried to cut down a cedar tree bordering the property line. Despite his best efforts, it took out one of Slavyanka's garden tressels. He fixed it the next day.

Having realized he was too old to cut down trees, his son hired a buddy who does it for work. Came and cut the remaining tree with no problem.

While he was there, I asked if he'd look at an old crabapple tree I had. He cut that for me at a great price. I'd clean it up.

Told the 80 year old neighbor I'd take his tree scrap to the dump, too. Next morning I go out to start working on mine and his tree and find he's already out there. He helped me clean up mine (bigger job than his) and I did 7 trips to dump the brush then 2 trips to a buddy's to drop off the usable firewood.

Long day, kicked my ass. I can imagine how tired he was.

Do it, and don't brag.

When I was a kid, I shoveled a bunch of frozen calf schit one winter when a teenager in our church got in a snowmobile accident and someone else had to perform his chores. I went to him in church one Sunday and told him to drive better from now on, the teens mom thought that was funny. That's probably why I hate snowmobiles. Another time I helped my father in laws cousins grandson get out of the ditch after a terrible blizzard when he just had to go see some girl. The cousin was one of my favorite people, I was glad to help. The cousin's wife sent us a thank you card that said here's $20 for helping our grandson. However, there was a 50 dollar bill in the card. That summed up those two. She was tight as a drum, he was generous. I told that story to his daughters at his funeral, they loved it. The kid I helped was Billy Zane's doppelganger, it was pretty crazy the resemblance. That's the story of the 2 times I helped people.

Wow I feel badly for some of you. I can't imagine not knowing the neighbors and doing things for each other. I've got a couple of neighbors who aren't very neighborly but by and large we're a pretty tight bunch up on our street. Fortunate I suppose.

I was nice to my neighbor lady once and now I own her house. I'm never being nice again.

We are called to serve others. Helping neighbors certainly fits there. It really should be considered a necessity of life. That’s how I am raising my kids anyway.

Hahaha, I suspect you'll survive!

You sound like my financial advisor who told me to stop whining.

My neighbors and I are all older. Some of us can still do some physical chores and some can't. We help one another when and where we can. It's amazing the knowledge that is available. None of us are going to dig a basement or landscape a house. Sometimes it's just nice to feel needed.

7mmStwer;
Good morning to you sir, I hope your section of New York state is getting seasonally acceptable and appropriate weather and you're well.

Full disclosure here to explain a couple things possibly important to the backstory, the first of which is I grew up on a Saskatchewan farm and in fact my wife and I farmed for a couple years when we were first married. That explains my deep and sometimes unhealthy connection to tractors. Secondly after doing some research into my family history, I come from a bit of a line of semi-professional alcoholics and as a result for the first decade we were married I was totally dry. To this day I have a very careful relationship with alcohol because frankly I really quite enjoy a lot of it.

All that to say then, this is a cautionary tale to those who might help their neighbors in a time of need, in this case an unusually heavy snowfall which corresponded with New Year's Day so the road clearing crews were way, way behind. Once I get the little 4x4 diesel fired up, it's fun for me to run for a few reasons, so there I was plowing out some of the neighbor's drives after clearing a path so folks could get out to the main road.

Here's a bit of a visual aid to envision the circumstance a wee bit better, which might be helpful for our 'Fire friends from snowless climactic regions.



Possibly the fact that it was New Year's Day and there were still some drinks left undrunk as it were, as I was finishing the first or second driveway, the homeowner appeared with 2 cans of beer and insisted I share one with him as we had a quick visit.

The next door to him was a couple which have since moved to South America for retirement, but the husband came out in a parka to share a shot of some new tequila one of his daughters had given him for Christmas.

So it was that shortly afterward, when I began to do our own driveway, as my good wife came out onto the front step to get a progress report from me and I approached her, she looked at me and more surprised than upset in any way asked, "Have you been drinking?"

Anyways all, don't drink and plow - or something like that.... Maybe...

Best to you all who help your neighbors - or not - and good luck on your hunts.

Dwayne