Cottonwood Cove

The Board here at Cottonwood Cove is, for lack of a better word, active. Any day of the week you can see any number of the five Board members out patrolling the common areas examining and taking notes.

Maybe “patrol” is a harsh word, but armed with their yellow notepads and matching white mesh baseball caps with dark blue brims they look a little patrol-y.

I try and avoid them whenever possible because if one of them stops you they offer up the same question every time, “Tell me, what do you think of the grounds?” I’m never sure how to answer that because I don’t care much about the grounds, so I always say, “They look nice, you all do a great job.” It wouldn’t be so bad if that ended it, but it never does because questions about the grounds is just a groundbreaker to other homeowner association business. Since I’m of the belief that paying my monthly dues and going to the annual meeting and not playing my stereo loud is the extent of my HOA involvement I’d prefer it ended there, but it doesn’t. There are questions ranging from my thoughts on the smoothness of the driveways to garden hose colors and I don’t know how to say that the only things I’m interested in is if the association pays for the yellow pads and the matching caps.

And so it was yesterday afternoon when I was heading out to run some errands and I opened my door to the sound of Board business. I quickly took a step back inside and quietly closed my front door and hid in the corner of my entryway and peeked through the blinds. I could hear the conversation through the door.

“Shirl, the garage lights all look good. Nothing needs to be replaced”

“Thanks Mary Beth. Greg was just telling me that the fencing needs some replacement staining along the parkway side and Adrian handed in a report on spider webs.” Mary Beth nodded along while quickly jotting the information down on her yellow notepad. “Walk with us and let’s see how Penny’s coming along with measuring the grass height. Can’t leave her to have all the fun now, can we?”

Greg laughed, Mary Beth scribbled and Adrian flicked what looked like a small spider off his left shoulder.

I watched them, 80% of the Cottonwood Cove Clique, walk away down a recently swept inner courtyard sidewalk, and when their voices faded to a faint whisper, I made a quick dash to my garage. I’m not sure that Shirl didn’t hear me, the woman has amazing hearing that would make an elephant jealous, but I didn’t stop to turn around and check.

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For Fandango’s One Word Challenge.