On getting officially sanctioned

We live in a rental house in a developed community in Sugar Land, Texas. As is typical of most developed communities around the area, the area Barrington Place, is patrolled and controlled by the Barrington Place home owners association. They supervise all aspects of appearance which might possibly impact of influence the uniform and acceptable appearance or marketability of the houses in the community.

Most of their supervision is done through a management company that drives through the area periodically taking notes and then sending out letters warning homeowners (and in our case tenants) of impending penalties for having the grass too long, hedges untrimmed, trash cans out on the sidewalk too far ahead of pick up, incorrect, in their eyes, outdoor lighting, ornamentation or inappropriate parking or items on the driveway. The efforts of the drive by evaluations are supplemented by the effort of a couple of old men who walk through the neighborhood every couple of days, whom wenot too fondly refer to as the “lawn Nazis.”

One of the most important functions of the HOA is to control when and where seasonally appropriate decorations appear and how long they stay. One of their most firmly enforced rules is that Christmas decorations may not be put up or displayed before November 29. This, of course is in direct contrast to the local stores which tend to lump their entire collections of Fall, the opening of Hunting Season (yes sad but true ) Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year decorations into one gigantic splurge which usually begins showing up in mid August. This lumping tends to create some very interesting juxtapositions of displays which have in the past included a selection of Nutcracker ornaments ranged in ranks making advances on the singing deer heads and Halloween pumpkins and Christmas trees trimmed with witches, turkeys and pilgrims.

The HOA has decided that “there will be none of that in Barrington Place, thank you very much!”, hence the stringent rules enforcing the deploying of Christmas décor.

Saturday, December 1, is the date that was officially declared for decorating this year. You could start a few days earlier if you had a complicated display but …..

So Saturday, Christmas décor was officially sanctioned and to prove it, the members of the HOA spent the day cruising through the neighborhood on a slow moving fire engine, waving at whoever happened to be out on the street and generally being patronizing to those they did encounter by reminding them that the official judging for the best display in the neighborhood would take place in a few hours. The dialogs were something along the lines of : ( inserted dialog partially overheard between siren moans, drunken revelry of HOA members and partially made up.)

HOA member: “where are your Christmas Decorations?”

Hapless renter(me): I hadn’t really planned to do any.”

HOA member: “But we have prizes.”
Hapless renter : “Good for you.”

HOA member: “Ahh..where’s your Christmas spirit?”

Hapless renter thinking : “ it got up and went when you cited me for having the lights up last year later than January 5th even though you had to have been nearly disjointing your neck to be peering in through the gate to have seen them,” and trying to smile pleasantly.

HOA member, having the good grace to realize that this is a dead end conversation and taking another swig from his coffee travel mug while slapping the HOA mobile/fire truck on the flank : “yee hah and giddy up, let’s keep movin on.”

So in case anyone is interested. You are now officially allowed to decorate the exterior of your house for Christmas, Solstice, New Year of any holiday occurring between December 1 and January 2, but unfortunately, you missed out on the HOA prizes and official blessing from the HOA and the HOA mobile .

Oh fie!