![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Being the asshole
Oct. 7th, 2020 04:02 pmAfter some wrangling, we (and by "we" I mean "technically the condo board, but effectively me") have managed to secure a contractor to come rebuild the leaking parapet. It's messy and inconvenient, in the way of construction work; there was a worrisome moment this morning, when the crew came to scope out the site, that there wouldn't be a place for them to put the lift. (The buildings on our street are jammed pretty close together, and our building in particular has no parking area—the little clear space around it is almost entirely parking for the neighboring buildings, and I have no idea who to begin talking to to negotiate using it.) Luckily the gangway beneath our decks is open to the sky, and there was just enough room for them to set it up there.
Unfortunately, the aforementioned crowded conditions have meant there's nowhere for the crew to park their truck other than in the alley, outside the gangway door; being a work truck, it takes up most of the alley width. Obviously this isn't ideal, as it's blocking traffic through the alley as well as blocking a few of the neighboring cars in, but I genuinely have no ideas on how it could work differently—they have to load up the demolished brick and bring in new materials/supplies, and if they parked on the street they'd literally have to walk a good quarter-mile around and back with each load. (The few narrow passageways between buildings are all closed off with gates.) So far I haven't had any complaints or heard any incipient shouting matches, but it's only day 1 and they're going to be working through Saturday. I'm genuinely unsure if they'll need the truck there the whole time (I'm hoping that, once they're done with the demolition work, they'll be able to unload everything and park it out of the way), but I'm not a masoner so I genuinely don't know.
It's a little funny, really; I've more than once come across a work truck blocking the alley (usually a cable or phone worker, though occasionally a contractor too) and just thought to myself "well, that's not ideal, but it's not like there's anywhere else for them to go" and gone around. But now that it's my responsibility I'm incredibly anxious about it. It's suddenly a different ballgame when You're The Asshole, even when there's literally no way around it. But often, that's really the only way we can coexist in a high-density space like a city—we all take turns being the asshole and hogging shared resources, and everyone else (hopefully) cuts us some slack because they know they'll probably need to do so at some point too.
I wonder if this is tied to the consistent finding that people who live in cities tend to be more tolerant than people in the suburbs or the countryside...I would imagine it's much easier to feel self-righteous about your place in the world when you don't have to constantly negotiate for shared space, even just on a mental "oh hey, I should move out of the entrance to the subway tunnel so people can get past me" level.
Unfortunately, the aforementioned crowded conditions have meant there's nowhere for the crew to park their truck other than in the alley, outside the gangway door; being a work truck, it takes up most of the alley width. Obviously this isn't ideal, as it's blocking traffic through the alley as well as blocking a few of the neighboring cars in, but I genuinely have no ideas on how it could work differently—they have to load up the demolished brick and bring in new materials/supplies, and if they parked on the street they'd literally have to walk a good quarter-mile around and back with each load. (The few narrow passageways between buildings are all closed off with gates.) So far I haven't had any complaints or heard any incipient shouting matches, but it's only day 1 and they're going to be working through Saturday. I'm genuinely unsure if they'll need the truck there the whole time (I'm hoping that, once they're done with the demolition work, they'll be able to unload everything and park it out of the way), but I'm not a masoner so I genuinely don't know.
It's a little funny, really; I've more than once come across a work truck blocking the alley (usually a cable or phone worker, though occasionally a contractor too) and just thought to myself "well, that's not ideal, but it's not like there's anywhere else for them to go" and gone around. But now that it's my responsibility I'm incredibly anxious about it. It's suddenly a different ballgame when You're The Asshole, even when there's literally no way around it. But often, that's really the only way we can coexist in a high-density space like a city—we all take turns being the asshole and hogging shared resources, and everyone else (hopefully) cuts us some slack because they know they'll probably need to do so at some point too.
I wonder if this is tied to the consistent finding that people who live in cities tend to be more tolerant than people in the suburbs or the countryside...I would imagine it's much easier to feel self-righteous about your place in the world when you don't have to constantly negotiate for shared space, even just on a mental "oh hey, I should move out of the entrance to the subway tunnel so people can get past me" level.
