My Neighbors Dug A Two-Acre Lake On My Land While I Was Out Of State—Then Told Me Their Contractor Said It Was Theirs, And That Was The Day I Learned How Expensive Arrogance Can Be

because most things worth saying don’t require decoration.

We never had a boundary problem. If one of his cows slipped through a weak spot, he came and got it. If a storm knocked a cedar across the fence, we cut it together. Once, his bull got loose and tore up half an acre of my ryegrass, and he showed up the next morning with two fence posts, a roll of wire, and an apology so brief it would have fit on a matchbook. That was enough. People worked things out