Yesterday I went for a walk. Ds, 10.5, was locked in, had my cell #, and knew I wasn't going to be gone more than 20 minutes. So his safety wasn't an issue.
I come back to my house after 20 minutes of walking in the neighborhood and see this guy, in his early 20's or so, on his scooter in the middle of our driveway. He was just looking at our house. I have no idea who he was, he had a few teeth missing and acted 'odd' in that I walked up my driveway and he didn't even look at me. Just kept staring at our house.
I said, just sort of 'professionally", not nice but not unkindly either, "Can I help you?" He just looked at me and said, "I'm just admiring". Hmm. Ok. Now thankfully he wasn't looking ME up this way, he was definitely looking at our house, and yard. But you can do that from the sidewalk, or the street. You don't come in someone's driveway and just gawk at it and pretend the other person isn't there.
He then went on to tell me how nice the yard looked, etc. and again I wasn't unkind, but not really nice either, just 'professional' is all I can call it, I said 'Thank you' several times when he tried to make small talk. The guy just kept where he was, gawking at our house and yard. Finally I stepped closer to him, and just raised my eyebrow and started staring at Him! Finally, he just turned and left, but went a few houses down, turned around, and kept staring at our house.
I then sat down on the front steps and stared him down until he finally left. I have no idea if he lives there or not. I don't know if he's 'challenged' or has other mental problems, but it's obvious that there was something wrong. I understand this, but whoever looks after him needs to tell him he just can't ride into other people's driveways and stare at their houses. I have mentioned this guy to ds, and he knew exactly who he was, because ds climbs a tree in our front yard and scopes out the whole street and has seen him. I told him to watch out for him, and if he sees him, to immediately let me know, that he seemed creepy to me and he shouldn't be in our driveway.
Now, I have mentally challenged people on both my side and dh's side of the family, and am not uncomfortable in most situations. However, like I said, what bothered me most was that he didn't even really seem aware that I was there as he just stood there and gawked. THAT was unnerved me about the situation, not that he was mentally challenged. Which I don't really know to what extent his illness was. Ugh.
