Crack dealers in the hood!

So my doorbell rings one morning and my dog loses her mind as usual. I am not expecting anyone so I look out through the glass door to see a big, husky man standing there with a stack of paper in his hand.

Avoiding my inner voice that’s screaming “Don’t open the door! You’re home alone! You’re in a housecoat! You could be murdered!” I open the door to a complete stranger while standing there in my housecoat because that’s what polite women do. We would rather people say “Too bad she opened the door to a stranger and was murdered” than “She wouldn’t open the door and was SO rude!” We wouldn’t want to offend anyone. Especially by passing judgement on a big, husky man who could easily overpower us.

Turns out this big, husky man, who I could now see was dressed in painting clothes, was a crack dealer and wanted to know if I was interested in buying some crack from him. I politely told him no, that I already had a crack dealer I had been using for years. He then asked me to take a flyer just in case I became unhappy with my crack dealer and wanted a new one or had a friend who was looking for a good crack dealer. I told him sure and I politely took his crack flyer and closed the door, but waited until he got to the end of the driveway before I locked it because I didn’t want him to think I thought he was a murderer too.

Well actually, he wasn’t selling crack. He was selling home repairs.

When I opened the door my dog, who was losing her mind because a stranger was at the door and who obviously had better safety instincts than me, and didn’t care about being rude, ran out the door and circled the guy’s feet while barking loud enough to alert the neighbours that a killer was in the neighbourhood. The man, in a feeble attempt to prove that he was not a murderer bent down to rub my dog.

That’s when his true intent was exposed! The crack!

His paint covered jeans pulled all the way down to the bottom or his hairy crack and his too short T-shirt rose all the way up his waist. All I could do was stand there in my house coat, frozen, unable to look away and feeling my morning coffee rising in my throat until I realized I had just thrown up in my mouth!

Being a lady, who is never impolite, I politely swallowed the thrown up coffee and continued to have a conversation with this man about dealing crack, or home renovations, in my neighbourhood.

He started fast talking me on his expertise with drywall, plastering and painting but all I could think about was that crack! I knew that I could not spend weeks, days or even an hour knowing that every time he bent down to pick up a tool I would be exposed to crack.

Then I had to think of my poor dog. He does like to lick everything. I could never let him kiss me again! I mean sure, I don’t mind him smelling another dog’s butt at the park but crack is wack! He may never go back!

I took the flyer and put it in the recycling can and figured it was the last of this crack dealer. That was until the next day when I was getting in my truck. The dog started losing her mind again. I had to chase her to the end of the driveway and grab the dog by the collar to settle her down. Then I noticed it… the crack was back! There it was across the street laying fence palings on my neighbour’s lawn. She had hired the crack dealer to fix her fence!

It was like driving past a car accident. I had to slow down and look. The crack was smiling back at me. From stem to stern!

The crack was back and smack in my tracks!

I had hoped by the time I came home that day her fence would be fixed and the hood would be back to normal.

Turns out she was running a crack house across the street. After the fence, he painted her garage door, then there was work on the inside. Apparently my neighbour has a crack problem.

Every time I left my house or came home, I had a crack attack.

She must have eventually been forced in to rehab by her husband because the crack dealer was gone after a week.

I was leaving my house this morning when I heard her call out to me. She was leaving for work and was waving hello. I couldn’t help but ask “Got all your renovations finished?”

“Yes” she answered, “I hired a local handyman. He took a long time to get the job done and his work was kind of sloppy. I wouldn’t recommend him.”

“Good to know” I smiled back at her.

Turns out in the end, our crack dealer wasn’t all he was cracked up to be!