Oh the Dutch

You have probably heard of Dutch Courage.  Certainly the phrase Going Dutch - and perhaps even of the trait Dutch Directness.  But I have one to add to the list... Dutch Discord.  As you can imagine, this stems from something that happened to me recently.


My week started off with a bang for sure.  Still struggling from jet lag (how can this be?) I was out repotting a tree at our front door at 7:30AM this Monday morning when I was greeted by a little old Dutch woman and her dog.  She had a few things to say about the poor state of my tree (and it really did look sad, I discovered it was diseased and had some sort of parasite, so it was being repotted, remember...) and the exchange went a little something like this:

She:  "I am so happy to finally meet the person who lives here... you never water this tree"

Me:  "I water this tree every morning when I take my dog out"

She:  "No, you never water this tree - the poor thing"

Me:  "Really?  Do you watch my house?  I water this tree every morning.  It has a disease... it has a bug"

She:  "What?!?  What is a bug?!?"

Me:  "Google it"

She:  "You should not be allowed to have anything living"

Me:  "Go away" 

She:  "I can see you are an angry person from looking at your eyes"

Me:  "Go away"

She:  "Do not tell me to go away"

Me:  "Go away, go away, go away..."

She:  "In all my 20 years I have never met anyone so rude in this neighborhood"

Me:  "I have been here 2 years and I feel the same"

She:  Well I never...

Me:  What?  You never go away?!?

And so out little tête-à-tête came to an end.  I know I handled this in a most obnoxious and immature way... believe me, I am not proud.  But slowly they (you know who they are) are driving me crazy.  They are wearing me down one day at a time.  Because there is always something... every day there is always something.  Being upbraided at your own front door - it is going to bring on a little Dutch Discord.