Would you Accept a Peace Offering?

It was a Saturday night and the doorbell rang. I opened the gate and I was surprised to see a young man and woman smiling at me. The man was holding two containers of food. “Good evening” they said, “we have a birthday party next door we thought of bringing you some food to share.”


I was taken aback by their friendliness and didn’t know how to react to the situation. Besides, I don’t even know these people and they don’t know me either. Although I recognized their faces, for I saw them all the time when I peeked through my bedroom window late at night at the neighbor’s yard next to ours.


They had awakened me many times at night with their excessive talking and laughing that would get louder and louder as the night progressed, a clue that they had too much to drink. Most of the time they pollute our living room with their cigarette smoke. It made me upset because the smell does not only gives me a headache but it could possibly irritates my airways and aggravate my asthma. There were more or less ten people in the group, one of them is the neighbor’s daughter and the rest are her friends.

At first, I thought they were just celebrating for she just came back home after a year of stay in America. My clue was the streamer that says “ Welcome Home” well-displayed in their front yard. However she’s been here for almost two months now but the late night parties had not stopped, instead it turned into a regular event. They seem like night owls and the neighbor’s yard became their favorite place to hang out.

 this place seems so quiet and peaceful... but wait until the sun goes down and the scene will drastically change

These men and women look well-educated and came from well-off families. They are around mid to late twenties. But I don’t understand why they’re acting like bunch of immature teenagers and seemingly lack of concern for other people’s feelings. I’d lost my patience a few times, I banged the window really loud when they were laughing repeatedly on top of their lungs at twelve o’clock midnight. They were startled and got quiet for a while but once they get intoxicated they seemed not to care anymore.
 

Anyway, that Saturday night two members of the clique were standing in front of me who appeared to be in different personas. They acted respectful, meek and friendly, persuading me to accept the food they brought as a kind of a peace offering…
 

All of a sudden I was facing a dilemma. I wasn’t prepared from this unexpected twist of event. But I needed to make a quick decision, to accept the peace offering or not. If I won’t accept, I may be perceived as rude and hard to please. However if I accept, it would mean truce and everything is forgiven. At that time, I wasn’t ready for a truce in fact I was preparing for war. I had been video recording some of their late night uproars as evidence to show when I’ll go file a complaint at the home owners association.

 

But then again the thoughts and humble gestures they showed me that night made me change my stance. They didn’t say sorry for disturbing me and my family for so many nights but their actions say it all. I could not help not to smile back and thanked them for the food. After I accepted it they were so appreciative and thanked me a few times, which still made me wonder what that “thank you meant”. Was it mean thanks for accepting the apology?
 

When my husband found out about it, he could not believed what I did.  “Why did you accept it? You should have thrown it in their faces”, he said. Well, easy to say but hard to do.
 

That night the party went on up to 2 a.m. and as usual it was loud. But we had to be tolerant for it’s a birthday party nonetheless.
 
The great thing about it though that they seemed to disappear after that night. It’s been more than two weeks since then. I have not seen any of the neighbor’s daughter’s friends yet. I was even expecting for a big hurrah on Christmas and New Years Day but it didn’t happen. None of them showed up not even a soul. YAY… It seemed that peace offering means " thank you and goodbye!"

It’s so peaceful and quiet again. I’ve been enjoying it. Mostly I love the quality sleeps I’ve been having nightly now. Finally, I can start writing again. How long this serenity would last? I don’t know, only the future will tell, but as of now I am enjoying the moments!