The Neighborhood Council Files: Sabbatical, Interrupted

I feel like I have lost control of the situation. I am both managing the idealistic and vengeful crusade of the council president and, at the same time, navigating how to help prevent the spread of malfeasance and criminal activity at the hands of the man behind the curtain. All of this while also navigating the familiar passive-aggressive territory of my neighbor, and the long-distance control freak volleys from my mother. This was supposed to be my sabbatical.

Yesterday was a perfect example of how this bullshit has escalated, and if I could, I would escape this place. Going back to my life in the United States is starting to look like a good idea.

The day began with the passive-aggressive text messages sent to me by my neighbor. The evening prior, she had been a fucking nuisance, acting out because I was tied up accompanying the municipality on their census of the neighborhood, and therefore was not available for her last-minute quest to the local supermarket. We were in her part of the hood for the census, so I asked her to actually answer her door, since it was clear she was home if she was texting me to leave to go somewhere.

When she came downstairs, I happened to be partnered with another member of the municipality who was in that moment polling one of the old women who sadly I happen to know doesn’t read. So I was standing by as a show of support in case she needed assistance. I glanced over my shoulder to see if the neighbor was looking my way so I could wave hello, but she was too busy schmoozing with the other members from the municipality to probably notice I was even there. Whatever, but I knew she was going to say something if I didn’t say hello.

By the time he was done polling the old lady, I looked, and the neighbor had finished and gone back inside. Oh well. Not much I can do there. She clearly either didn’t see me or wanted to be chased. The former was not my problem, and the latter was not on the table. I don’t chase anybody. I continued with the census team to the other parts of the neighborhood. Later she sent me a text complaining that I didn’t even go over to say hello. I called it. My reply was that she had already gone inside when I went by her house. She had no response. Again, not my problem.

When the census was over, and the other council member who lives on my street and I were heading home, we ran into the neighbor. She asked me if I could go with her to do this errand to drop off perfumes in another part of the city at the end of the week. I tell her I will have to let her know because I know the council has plans to go to the police station to file a police report against the man behind the curtain. She’s like ok, let me know and goes on her way.

Yesterday morning, the passive-aggressive bullshit returns full force. She sends two short texts which translate to this:
My faithful companion—I couldn’t anymore…
Because now she’s the important secretary of the Colonia.

First of all, I don’t appreciate sarcasm, especially bullshit sarcasm aimed at either making fun of the job I take pretty fucking seriously considering the gravity of the crap that we are handling and the bullshit complaints we are getting from the ignorant masses who are purposefully ignorant and complaining that we are doing the job we clearly stated we would do.

Second of all, I am not her goddamned faithful companion. I’m not getting paid or compensated to accompany her every goddamn place; therefore, I am not at her beck and call. I have a fucking life, and previously I chose to go places with her because it was an excuse to get out of the house and see the city. But I won’t be doing that anymore if this is the shit she’s going to pull. She survived 40+ years without me here. She can survive without me again. Fuck this shit.

The day continued to get more tedious, because at the same time that I am receiving these messages from the neighbor (which remain on read with no reply), I am receiving a barrage of messages from the council president. This weekend is the next general assembly. But since the last assembly that was held a month ago, the community has devolved into a mass of idiots, willfully misremembering information and choosing instead to believe the lies and fabrications from the man behind the curtain only because his information is literally just shit spread in the form of messages in a group chat, and our messages you have to actually read because to be clear and transparent can’t be condensed into 120 characters. The truth, unfortunately, is not concise.

Daily, I have to curb her expectations. Every time she asks for us to write these treatises to the community, or the solicitations for whatever the hell project we have to complete off the never-ending checklist of aging pending tasks leftover from the previous administration, she always underestimates just how much time it is going to take us to complete. Case in point, we have been working on a communique to list the crimes committed against the community by the man behind the curtain for the last 10 days. The work on it got interrupted when other issues/crisis emerged, which pushed that communique to the back burner, which was the one-week deadline to receive and review feedback on the proposed bylaws, which had to be done before the assembly.

Unfortunately, there are only three days until the assembly, so not only did the bylaw revisions have to be completed, but it would be a good idea to get this communique published before then too. We agree to meet at 4pm to make the revisions, which, according to her, should only take a few hours. I know this is a falsehood because no document revision with her takes a few hours. And like all other days this month, it isn’t just a matter of doing one thing; we are spread thin like jelly, so we also had to hold office hours from 6pm-8pm for the community for other reasons predicated by the actions of the man behind the curtain.

My plan had been to go home after the office hours were over because she had promised that we would be done editing the few bylaw revisions that had been submitted by the time the office hours were completed. Nope. Nope. Nope.

The other council member had already left at 7pm. So I get dragged to her house under the premise of spending one more hour completing the revisions.

I thought we had all the evidence we needed to gather, and it was just a matter of formatting the document. Nope. Once again, it is a thousand revisions later because what was a “mostly completed” version turned out to have a bunch of “pending” parts and referenced evidence missing, which was then gathered and added. It took way more than just an hour, and once again I didn’t get home until after 1am. 😩

At this point, I am so over this situation, and I haven’t even mentioned the man behind the curtain. His dumbass is causing me the most headaches. If there were some kind of actual legal system here, I would sue him on account of losing sleep, personal time, and the general pain and suffering caused by his general misdeeds.

For example, in the gathering of the forgotten evidence, I was reminded that back in May he had been complaining to the outgoing council that they had not filed the necessary paperwork to complete the authorization that should have been in place BEFORE the upgrades the man behind the curtain paid to have installed to the security gates. This was put off until the new council was voted in, and we just submitted the necessary paperwork to the municipality last week. One of the requirements was a census of the community.

Explain to me why this idiot thought it would be a good idea to organize his minions to vote no on the census – which needs 80% of the neighbors to vote yes for the upgrades in order to get the authorization to KEEP the upgrades installed approved by the municipality. After the census was done, they were all bragging in his stupid group chat of how brilliant they were to have voted no on the census to show the council that they can’t be bossed around. What the actual fuck?

I had to post an announcement thanking those who opened their doors to answer the census, and explaining the ramifications of having voted no to those that chose to do so: that if the census results led to a rejection of the authorization for the already installed upgrades, they would be REMOVED at the cost to the community. And the $54k spent to have them upgraded would be for nothing. Seriously! What is wrong with these fucking people???

After I posted that message, then the minions were like, omg, why didn’t anyone tell us that is what the census was for? I can’t even. We did; you fucking idiots ignored those messages and announcements made for the last week that explicitly explained what they were for because you chose to believe rumors and gossip spread by the man behind the curtain over facts from his “enemies,” aka the council.

I give up. This community is full of fucking fools. And here I am, the day after this fucking debacle, lost sleep, and awoken by more texts from the council president who apparently did not sleep and now wants MORE REVISIONS to the document?!

As I said, I am beginning to regret joining the council, I regret getting involved in this community, and I regret that this is making me regret my decision to come to Guatemala since the last two months have been a growing and continuing nightmare. The language barrier only adds to my frustration as I have to pause and think out every statement, instead of just letting loose in my usual barrage of ready-aim-fire words.

Seriously, someone save me, please. Something’s gotta give.