Glen Farms Civic Association

Neighbors

My husband and I moved from Atlanta, GA in 1992 .with our 2 sons,4 and 13. School was starting the following week and we hadn't found a place to rent until I walked into Patterson Scwartz and asked the agents coming out of a meeting if they had anything for rent. They talked amongst themselves and suggested a home that had been on the market for 2 years with absentee owners whom had moved back to Montana. They called the owners who agreed to rent us their house at 1 Hillcrest Lane, in Glen Farms.My younger son went to preschool while my older son went to Cherry Hill Middle School 8th grade. My olders son had excelled in math and had already completed ninth grade algebra. There was noexcelerated program in geometry unless he was bussed to Elkton High School so they handed him a geometry book and told him to teach himself.He passed Geometry but decided to repeat it in ninth grade as he had no classroom feedback. He later graduated from Elkton, got the presidents award ,took AP courses and decided to go to Cecil for his first 2 years of college. Which worked out well as we had just started a new business and he would be available for his younger brother. He later went onto Towson University and graduated "Summa cum laude" in Accounting, was hired by an accounting firm and passed all 4 parts the first time he took the CPA exam. Younger brother went to Cecil Manor , K-5 and I assisted with the reading program. My husband And I were teachers. He was a shop teacher, highschool coach and drivers ed teacher. I was a Spanish teacher.I looked forward to being part of a close neighborhood. I was the TIger Cubs coordinator as I arrived with prior training as a den leader for my older son.I volunteered oftas often as I could at cecil Manor and chaperoned many field trips. I guess neighbors just aren't like they used to be. When my 62 yr old husband and I are sholveling our long driveway, the neighbors always wave but have never offered to plow our driveway for us. They also wave from their riding mowers as my husband and I chase each other around with our push mowers. When we lived in Atlanta, we helped many neighbors, we were the only ones with snow shovels!

I have always been generous to a fault and have taken excess vegetables from my garden to our neighbors. My neighbors kept bees. they sold honey and gaveit out as Christmas gifts. Never get involved with beekeeping if you don't know whatyou are doing. It's also a little complicated when your new neighbor, me, is allergic to bees. Often through the years my boys would warn me not to get out of the van as the black bee cloud was hovering over our driveway. Little did I know that this means the hives are too fulland they have split off to fcreate a new hive and a new queen. Unfortunately the last time they decided to takeup residence in our house There was aloose brick due to new siding and that was where they decided to reside. Being good neighbors we agreed to wait until our beekeeping neighbor returned 2 weekds later from Japan toremove the hive, the queen and the stash of honey. The neighbor on the corner had this happen, put up a hive and was also in the honey business. However, his queen had died over the winter so he now wanted ours. We were offered beekeepers outfits and wwere told that we were lucky to have such an active hive and such a wonderful queen. When you're allergic and you walls are humming and you fear for your life ,this is not a choice you want to make.The bees were in our living room ceiling, right under our master bedroom. We were going away to abaseball tournamen in West Virginia . My younger son was home from Towson where he also majored in accounting and played division 1 baseball. Hewas playing for Cecil Legion and was hitting long home runs! On the day of my birthday our 2 neighbors cut a hole in our living room ceiling and vacuumed out the bees. There was so much honey and now the population had grown to at least 10,000. They took the honey and the queen and worker bees to the neighbors house on thecorner then they sprayed bee killer in my house and sealed the outside openings to prevent bees from returning. However, they also sealed hundreds of bees in our walls which started coming out of every opening in our house when we returned and yes i was stung numerous times. Luckily I did not go into shock but swelled greatly atall the sting sights- my foot twice I could not work or walk for a week.The last straw was when I went down the basement to retrieve my son's baseball uniform from the dryerand several bees dropped down my back from the overhead ac vent and then I stepped on live bees with my barefeet that were on the floor of our upstairs bedroom. I went into shock I was beeing attacked in my own house, my sanctuary. I went next door and offered to trade houses with my beeloving neighbors. They had the bees outside in 5 hives on our property line. We hadwereliving with them inside our home. Of course they didn't want to do that! Instead they offered to put us up in a hotel in Reading, PA! What is wrong with these beepeople putting insects ahead of people! And they called me the crazy lady! Iwas. The bees were driving me crazy I feared for my life! My doctor said if Iwas stung inthe throat or near the heart I could die so he prescibed an epi pen. I was diagnosed with post traumatic distressed and saw a psychiatrist. I had moved out of our bedroom into the gmy son's roomas he had vacated it to live with his friend in PA. We tried to sue our neighbors for emotional distress, loss of consortium and damage to our home and peaceful way of life. Tothis day they have never said they were sorry. However,  the hives were removed from their property- after they had waited to harvest the honey. I was offered a forever supply of their honey but can't stand to smell or look at the stuff now. We also found out that we needed DNA samples from our bees and their bees to prove our case. We were summoned to a meeting with their homeowners insurance company which paid for the damage to our house and my medical bills. The beekeeper lied and said that they weren't his bees, must have been feral bees so we had no recourse but to accept their insurance company's low offer. This has left such an emotional scar as wellas amped up my fear of all bees (had 1 in my car today-I freaked)Isn't it nice to live in such a beautiful community with all the wildlife, nature and ponds like Glen Farms howeverour view has been tainted. We became the bad people whomade our neighbors move their bees. Now I can't look at them and they certainly have never looked us in the eyes again. How sad to live in a wonderful neighborhood under these conditions.