I was expecting a repair crew to come by and fix or replace our dying washing machine in the afternoon. To make it easier for them to access the back door/kitchen, I moved the van out of the driveway. As I was parking on the street in front of our house, I saw our next door neighbors pull into their driveway. I waved to them as they exited the car. They didn't return the wave, so I figured they hadn't seen me, and I went back inside.
[Sidebar: the preceding paragraph is a good example of the use of imperfect and preterite verb tenses in Spanish!]
About half an hour later, I heard a knock on the front door. I expected it to be the appliance repair people, but when I opened the door, I saw my neighbor. She said, "I just wanted to come over and apologize for not waving back to you earlier. We were coming home from a funeral and we were a bit down, so I'm sorry." I was surprised! I said, "Oh, I'm so sorry to hear that. Don't worry about it!" I gave her a hug.
Then the babies squawked and she said, "Oh, are the boys awake? Can I see them?" She came into the playroom and cooed over them for awhile. (Unfortunately they were in a pretty bad mood due to not taking a nap, so they screamed a lot...it isn't polite to scream at your admiring visitors, boys.)
For context, these neighbors are probably about 80 years old. They have lived in their house for 50 years. They are kindly grandparent types :)
What I learned from this interaction:
- It is vitally important to wave at your neighbors in the South. The only acceptable excuses for not waving are extreme personal distress (grief/sorrow), or probably illness/injury.
- If you do not wave at a neighbor, you should apologize when you are able and offer an explanation for your rude behavior.
- Or, perhaps, if you want to visit your neighbor and see some cute babies, you can do so under the guise of apologizing for lack-of-waving.
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