The Gate

First of all, I really dislike the gate. I do understand putting a gate on your property. But it is not my property, or my gate. The people who are enforcing the law of the gate are not inconvenienced by it multiple times every day because they live on the other "non-gated" side.

I have been told that I need to document everything that happened yesterday, so this is the best place I can think of that the information will not get lost. I will write a history of the problem later, but for now here are the events that happened yesterday.

I came home from soccer practice and got to the driveway about 5:30. Keith was in the neighbors house and Chris (the Grandson who lives at the house on the corner) invited me in because they were having a conversation about putting an automatic gate opener. However, I never heard a word mentioned about the gate opener at all. Chris's dad Dave (who lives somewhere south in Mount Lake Terrace I think), was telling Keith the history of the property when I got inside. He told us about Goldie (the Grandma who actually lives at the house on the corner) and her brother who disagreed about the property and how Goldie's family took them to court to get what they deserved and take control of the road.

He talked about how he (dave) dug a trench through the driveway with out telling Marko and was shocked when marko was upset that they couldn't drive their cars down the road.

He told us that there was a dog on the property (13 years ago) that would run in the field where they kept their cows. They don't keep cows anymore, he said because the dog was a nuisance. I think it is because Goldie is in her late 90's and lived alone until last spring. How is a 96 year old woman supposed to keep livestock?

Dave then told us that we can not let our dogs run off leash on our property and he would shoot them if he ever saw then up by the gate. At that we were pretty shocked. The dogs NEVER come that far down the driveway. They stay on the porch or on the lawn, other than to chase a coyote. My ears were ringing that he had just made a threat like that.

Dave then told us about how the road had encroached onto their property over the last 60 years and he wants that all back. I will just put in a reminder that we are only house sitting on this property, we have been staying in the house since December of 2008, the Jukanoviches have owned the property for 13 years, and Dave's uncle owner it the 47 years prior to that.

The whole conversation kept jumping decades and complaints. I couldn't keep track of what he was talking about because we were not involved in any of the problems that he was citing.

He then told us that "If he ever saw our dogs on his property he would shoot them". This was different than the first threat that if he saw the dogs at the gate he would shoot them. Our properties share a lot of property line. In my mind I could see he him unprovoked sitting on the road with his rifle waiting for any opportunity. Annie is our family, not just a pet. I don't know if this guy could possibly understand that he just told me he was going to murder my family member. It makes me sick to my stomach just thinking about it.

I did call the police to document the incident they gave me a number (SO 09-205573).

Again, nothing about the gate opener was ever mentioned.