It was signed, Darlene Fisk, President, on behalf of the Board of Directors.
I read it three times. Then I took out my copy of the declaration and read Article VII, Section 12 again. It prohibited "noxious or offensive activity," "anything which may be or become an annoyance or nuisance to the neighborhood," and "the keeping of livestock, poultry, or swine," with an exception for "up to two household pets of a customary nature." It said nothing about height or vegetation. The Enhanced Landscape Standards had never been adopted.
I wrote back. I was polite, because I was raised by a woman who sent thank-you notes for thank-you notes. I explained that the plants were kenaf, an annual fiber crop related to hibiscus, grown for a papermaking hobby. I said they would be harvested in early October and cut to the ground. I pointed out, gently, that there was no height restriction in the declaration, and that the proposed landscape standards had been tabled at the annual meeting. I offered to walk any member of the board through the yard. I emailed a copy to Trevor at the management company and slid a printed copy into Darlene's mail slot.
I got no reply. Two days later, at seven in the morning, I looked out my bedroom window and saw a woman in the greenbelt behind my back fence, holding a telescoping fibreglass measuring pole, the kind surveyors use, extended beside my tallest stalk. It was Darlene, in a sun visor. She was photographing the pole against the plant with her phone. When she saw me at the window she didn't startle. She lowered the pole, slowly, one section at a time, folded it under her arm like a parade baton, and walked home.
* * *
After that, the letters came about once a week, always hand-delivered, always in blue ballpoint capitals.
My trash and recycling bins were visible from the street "by approximately four (4) inches" on non-collection days. That was true. My side-yard enclosure was short by about four inches, a defect the builder had installed. The fine was twenty-five dollars. I paid it, put a concrete paver under each bin to shift them back, and took a photo with a ruler in it. I'm an archivist. I always put a ruler in the photo.
I was conducting "commercial activity in a residential zone," based on "frequent parcel carrier visits." I sent back the declaration's home-occupation clause, which allowed exactly what I was doing so long as there was no customer foot traffic and no signage, plus a screenshot of my shop, which had sold eleven sheets of paper that week.
My porch light was "an unapproved colour temperature." I didn't even answer that one. I just changed the bulb to the warmest one I could find, so my porch glowed like a candle in a Dutch painting, and waited to see if she'd complain about that too. She didn't. I like to think it confused her.
My drip irrigation timer was unplugged twice in one week. The outlet was on the outside of my garage, on the side facing Darlene's house, and the timer was a cheap one that lost its program when it lost power. Each time I found my kenaf wilted at the tips in the afternoon heat. Each time I plugged it back in, reprogrammed it, and told myself the outlet was faulty, because the alternative was a thought I didn't want in my head.
The third time, I bought a doorbell camera.
It was nothing fancy, the kind you can buy at the hardware store for under a hundred dollars and install with two screws and a phone app. I mounted it by the front door, where the instructions said to. It covered my porch, the front walk, and the top of my driveway. Down at the curb, my mailbox post sat at the very left edge of the frame, where the image bent like a fishbowl. I spent half an hour drawing motion zones on the app, trying to keep it from pinging me every time a car went by, and finally set it to alert only for people. I thought about putting a second camera on the side of the garage, by the outlet. Then I thought about what kind of person I was becoming, and didn't.