One should never wonder, out loud or in print, how things could possibly get worse, because inevitably they do. Things got worse here about three weeks ago, and they were already pretty chaotic.

Backing up a bit: A couple of months ago, the people who own the neighboring house (on the side of both my bedroom and my office/studio) decided to build a substantial Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU, alias a granny flat) in their back yard. Not only are they building it on my side of their yard, but they are also putting an extension onto the house behind their garage on the same side, and the ADU is two-story and overlooks my back yard. When I saw the initial framing, I realized I was going to be dealing with noise and chaos for at least three months, possibly longer.

I attempted to find out who owns the house now (it sold in October of last year), but was unsuccessful. It appears to be some business in Las Vegas. But I did find out who had recently sold the house to them (it’s been a renter for about 30 years), so I contacted the realtor and asked them to put me in touch. Instead of the owner, however, the contractor came to my door. Apparently there’s no one living in the house while the building is going on, although the contractor says the owner does plan to live there (I have my doubts).

Anyway, I told the contractor that I had no expectation of silence for the next three months, since, as the daughter of a builder, I know what varieties and decibels of noise come from framing and plumbing and plastering, with their use of table saws and skill saws, nail guns and staple guns, drills, cement mixers, etc. I did ask him, however, to please ask his crew to have some respect for the fact that they are working in a neighborhood, not on a construction site. They needed to keep their voices down, talking in normal tones of voice rather than shouting at each other across the yard, and they absolutely could not do things like play radios turned up to be audible above all the building noises. (I had ample experience, last year when another neighbor’s house was re-roofed, of eight hours of mariachi music blaring from the top of the house for three days.)

He assured me that everyone on his crew was sensitive to all those things, having worked a lot on ADU-type projects in already established neighborhoods. And for the first two months or so, the workmen were duly considerate. But then, things started to get lax. I don’t know if they brought on new people to do the different tasks as the building progressed and no one had “the talk” with them, but for the past two weeks there has been nothing but shouts and whistles and loud conversations, often right underneath my windows between the houses.

There was also, one day, about 10 minutes of a blaring radio, until I unlocked my back door and shouted until I gained someone’s attention, and then said “the contractor promised NO MUSIC.” I got some looks of incomprehension, so I got Google to translate it into Spanish and said it again (I don’t speak the language, but have a decent accent from all the years of listening). No music has ensued since then, but the shouting continues.

I looked up Los Angeles ordinances to find out when they can work. They are allowed to start at 7 a.m. on weekdays, and at 8 a.m. on Saturdays, and are not allowed to work on Sundays. So far they have stuck to the Sunday thing, but have worked every other minute they are able. But the 7 a.m. start time is deceptive, and if I could speak with the contractor again (I stupidly failed to ask for his phone number) I would hold him to the letter of it; they don’t start hammering until 7 a.m., but they all arrive for work about 6:45, parking out front and slamming car doors, and chatting with one another as they walk between the houses, so 6:45 is the actual start time. Ditto on Saturday at 7:45. The only blessing to this is that they are making excellent progress (they finished up nailing the wire lath to the walls yesterday), and today (a national holiday, but apparently not for them) they are laying on the plaster on both levels.

This is a hardship for me, because I am often awake because of pain into the wee hours and don’t drop off until five or six in the morning. I used to be able to get a few hours rest after that, but no more.

I’ll bet you are thinking that this is the thing that got worse. You would be wrong. This is merely somewhat annoying background. The thing that’s driving me truly batshit crazy is something I haven’t yet figured out, but am hoping to resolve this week.

On December 29th (yes, three weeks ago), I started hearing a noise. I could hear it from my living room, even over the sound of the television, and I could hear it from the bedroom quite clearly. At first, when I heard it in the daytime, I thought it was something emanating from the building site next door, but then it went on into the wee hours of the morning. At first it was at a lower tone, a sort of squeaking that sounded kind of like morse code—the sound would go on for a while, then it would stop, repeat, go on for a few short bursts, stop, then back to longer, sustained notes, and so on. I had no idea what it was; finally, after two days, I texted my neighbors, Phil and Nichole, and asked them if they heard it. Phil answered that yes, Nichole and their daughter had both noticed it (Phil apparently has tinnitus and couldn’t distinguish it from whatever else he hears) and couldn’t figure out where it was coming from.

The next day Phil texted me again and said that they had gone outside and wandered around a bit, and the noise was definitely coming from the house across the street. Phil said he had also seen the neighbor from one side of that house come outdoors and look around, pausing for a long time in front of the house. Phil’s theory was that it’s a roof vent that has become dislodged, and metal is rubbing against metal when the wind blows. At first I thought he might be right, because on New Year’s Eve it rained torrents, and the noise abruptly stopped.

That was, however, almost three weeks ago. The noise didn’t start again for a day or two, and then all of a sudden it was back. The pitch had changed to a higher sound and now, instead of short intermittent sounds, it was much more sustained. It sounds to me more like someone using some kind of tool to grind metal (like when you’re at the mechanic’s and they are grinding the rotors on your brakes). It went all night long for a couple of nights, but a couple of days ago it started at about 10 a.m., lasted until 10 p.m., and stopped for the night, as if someone is doing something during specific hours. Last night it stopped at 10:00 and I breathed a sigh of relief, having been plagued by it all evening; but then it started up again at 10:30 and kept on going. I finally fell asleep in spite of it, and this morning it was gone again. I haven’t heard it today so far, but I’m sure it will be back.

Between the yelling from the construction guys next door and the weird persistent shrieking from the neighbor’s house across the street, my already less-than-ideal existence has become the experience of chinese water torture. I can’t get away from the sound, I can’t get away from the yelling, and I can’t leave the damn house and walk to either location to try to fix things.

I lost my temper this morning; it’s Martin Luther King Day, supposedly a holiday, but a full-fledged crew showed up today anyway, and there are two guys who have big mouths and are constantly shouting at each other and the rest of the crew. I finally went to my back door, stuck my head out, and shouted that they were being too loud. When they ignored me, I yelled that I needed to talk to whoever was in charge. The two guys plastering on that side just looked blankly at me, and one said “no habla.” So I just kept shouting. Eventually, when I said again “I want to speak to the person in charge,” one of the loudmouths stuck his head out from indoors and asked “Why?” I told him to come over to the fence so I could talk to him, and he laughed and started shouting to the other guys, something about “loco.” I don’t speak a lot of Spanish, but I do know that word. I got really mad and yelled that I would report them to the city. The guy who speaks some English started laughing and shouting loudly at the others and then stuck his head and arm back out and yelled something at me that included “loco” again. I made it worse. Now he is out there shouting and whistling and whooping and singing loudly whenever he gets close to my side of the building.

I just sat down at my desk and wrote two notes. One I used Google to translate into Spanish, then had it translate it back into English to make sure there weren’t any errors. It says that I am elderly and disabled and don’t leave the property. I don’t mind the construction noise, but their boss promised me that there would be no loud voices, and I was asking them to please respect the neighbors, since this is not a construction site but a neighborhood.

The other is addressed to the neighbor across the street; it explains about hearing the persistent, maddening noise coming from her house, and asks her to please fix or disable whatever is causing it because it’s driving me mad.

My cousin Kirsten is visiting me this afternoon to help with a project, and I am going to ask her to deliver the notes. Who knows whether this will resolve the problems or exacerbate them. I was respectful and polite; but in this age of internet license, everyone apparently feels it is their duty to be as rude as possible to anyone who engages them.

It’s possible I should have just written the note to the builders in the first place, instead of screaming at them like a harpy out of my back door, but…I’m elderly! I’m disabled! (Yeah, I know, I might as well say “I’m privileged!”) But…I’m in pain, I’m exhausted, I’m frustrated, I’m sick of inconsiderate people, I’m DONE. So…there it is.