My Neighbor Is Using Talk Radio as a Weapon Against His Wife. I’m Caught in the Crossfire.

Dear Prudence Advice by Enter your email to receive alerts for this author. Sign in or create an account to better manage your email preferences. Unsubscribe from email alerts Are you sure you want to unsubscribe from email alerts for Jenée Desmond-Harris? Nov 02, 20267:30 AM Photo illustration/animation by Slate. Photos by Getty Images Plus. Our advice columnists have heard it all over the years—so we’re diving into the Dear Prudence archives to share classic letters with our readers. Submit your own questions to Prudie here. Dear Prudence, I’m trying to figure out how to talk to my neighbor about noise without riling him up too much. My husband, our toddlers and I live in an area similar to where I grew up—rural, large land lots, no town-enforced noise laws, and people mostly mind their own business. The occasional early morning chainsaws, noisy parties, and target practice are all pretty live and let live, which is how we like it. I’ve never had to negatively talk to neighbors about much of anything because distance does it all for us. There’s one recent exception. Our neighbor across the road is going through a sticky divorce and in the fight for the house, he’s trying to drive his wife out with noise—largely high-volume, profanity-laden talk radio, and loud car noises late at night. It’s enough that it’s interrupting our kids’ sleep. How do I push back on this when there’s such a culture of minding your own business in our area? To give context, we’re so rural there’s no local police force, so I’d be hesitant to call a noise complaint to the county, who would take at least an hour to get here, even if I did believe calling the cops was the right answer. I have to have a neighborly talk to this guy and I have no idea how. Scripts? Ideas? Ways to band together our independent, privacy-minded neighbors to push back at him? —Keep It Down Dear Keep It Down, I see nothing wrong with a note left in his mailbox saying, “Hi from your neighbor across the street. We were wondering if you could turn down the volume on your radio and keep the car noise to a minimum after 8 p.m. The kids have been having some trouble sleeping. Thanks for considering!” But honestly, you’re worried about the noise; I’m worried about this guy’s wife. He sounds absolutely unhinged and dangerous. And for all the talk about minding your own business, you haven’t: You know what’s going on in their marriage, what he’s doing to torment her, and why. To the extent that you band together the neighbors, I think it should be to reach out to this woman as discreetly as possible, let her know that you are all aware of what’s going on, and ask how you can support her as she navigates the end of a marriage with someone who will seemingly stop at nothing to cause her harm. —Jenée Desmond-Harris From: Help! My Neighbor Is Trying to Drive His Wife Out of the House With Loud Noises. (December 12th, 2022). Please keep questions short (<150 words), and don’t submit the same question to multiple columns. We are unable to edit or remove questions after publication. Use pseudonyms to maintain anonymity. Your submission may be used in other Slate advice columns and may be edited for publication. Dear Prudence, My best friend “Nova” and I (he/him) are practically siblings—we met when we were preschoolers and have been best friends since. When my parents disowned me for being gay, it was Nova and her family who took me in, so they’re my surrogate family. Nova has a much older brother, “Ethan,” who was in high school while we were in elementary. Ethan was a stereotypical popular football captain but he had a heart of gold deep inside. In a way, he was my “gay awakening” and I’ve always harbored a tiny crush on him. It was just a private fantasy, though. Ethan married his high school sweetheart and they were extremely happy, or so I thought until I discovered Ethan sobbing on Nova’s parents’ porch one night. We got to talking and it turns out his baby daughter’s not his and he’s been living a lie. The topic eventually switched to how little sexual experience he has due to marrying his girlfriend straight out of school. Specifically, he wondered what it’s like to be with a man. He asked me if I was willing to try it out. Despite knowing I was a rebound and he probably was straight, I couldn’t resist my ultimate fantasy since I was a kid and said yes. After that night we agreed to never speak about it, much to my disappointment. However, just a week later he told me that he couldn’t stop thinking about me, and I said the same… so we continued. It’s been months now. He’s trying to settle the divorce with his soon-to-be ex-wife, and in the meantime, we’ve been hooking up on the down-low. Here’s the thing: I want a relationship with this man. He’s everything I could want, so doting, so sweet, so funny, and so attractive. I think I love him but I haven’t been able to tell anyone, not even my basically-sister Nova. His family doesn’t even know he’s bisexual, let alone dating their surrogate son. Us dating openly will surely complicate things, not to mention I don’t even know if he feels the same about me. What should I do? —Keeping It in the Family Dear Keeping It, don’t know if there’s any point in giving this advice because you are already in so deep and people who are infatuated don’t really listen to reason. But here it goes: I guarantee you’ll meet other people who are sweet, funny, doting, attractive, and who make you want a relationship. I seriously doubt you’ll ever find another surrogate family.So don’t ruin what you have with Nova and her parents. And to be clear, it will be ruined if you and Ethan get together and then break up, which you probably will, considering his life is currently in turmoil and he has a ton of baggage. Plus, he has not even said he wants to be out! Or to be out with you! Enjoy this fling for what it has been and let it motivate you to find someone who brings the same qualities to the table in a less complicated way. —J.D.H. From: Help! My Best Friend’s Family Took Me In. It’ll All Blow up if They Find Out About What I’ve Been up to With Her Brother. (December 14th, 2022). Dear Prudence, Hopefully a low stakes question! I’m happily married. I love my husband and our life together very dearly. I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize what we have built. We have two school-age children and here’s the weird bit: I have found myself developing a sort of a crush for one of my kid’s teachers, who is definitely younger than me. We have talked and, to me, it seemed obvious there is a sort of connection (think unusual things in common/hobbies, general physical attraction). I have recognized it and backed off being involved with the class, leaving my husband to attend conferences and field trips. But I am still having very erotic dreams about this teacher! It has made me confused and even more awkward around him. I have backed off as much as I could, and I don’t think about him during the day. But jeez, how can I stop the dreams? It’s very jarring and unwanted! I don’t let those thoughts in during sex with my husband, but I still just want to understand the why? Is this okay? Normal? Should I tell my husband? — Not Hot for Teacher Dear Not Hot, Give yourself a break! Think about what you’d want your husband to do if he developed a crush on one of the kids’ teachers: recognize it and back off. You did it! Would you expect him to control his subconscious? I don’t think so. Have dreams. Enjoy the dreams. (Not like you really have a choice!) When you stop obsessing over the dreams, they’ll probably fade away and leave you with a real-life marriage that sounds admirably strong. No need to tell your husband any of this. —J.D.H. From: Help! My Daughter Is Furious With Me for Liking a Facebook Post of Her Ex. (December 15th, 2022). Classic Prudie We (myself, husband, two small kids) have a 60-ish pound lab-mix dog we got from the shelter four years ago as a maybe 1-year-old. She’s great with the kids (although we would still never leave them unsupervised together), and we’ve trained her pretty well, although she definitely lacks perfect recall if there’s something really exciting going on. My in-laws love her but refuse to enforce any discipline with her, and sometimes actively encourage poor behavior. So, while she never jumps on us, she does as soon as they walk through the door as they pat their legs, call her over, and catch and hold her front paws. When the in-laws come over, the dog basically misbehaves and is rowdy and in their faces the whole time. If we attempt to correct her, they tell us it’s no problem. Now that we brought home our new baby, they express concern over the dog’s rambunctious behavior and worry that she’ll accidentally injure him. Never miss new Slate Advice columns Get the latest from Prudie and our columnists in your inbox each weekday, plus special bonus letters on Saturdays. Advice Family Real Estate