Susie’s head was filled with thoughts of what was wrong. First, she was not tall enough. On the other hand, Tara, her neighbor was five foot eight. She could still wear heels. She could play basketball successfully. Susie had a bad case of next door neighbor envy.

For example, Tara’s grass always looked good. Her husband took care of fertilizing it, cutting it and trimming around the house and patio. Susie’s grass, on the other hand, looked bare in spots and weedy in spots where it wasn’t bare. Her grass looked like it was cut with the echo chainsaw her husband bought to trim trees with. Of course, it wasn’t. The efficient chainsaw was used only for trimming those trees at the lot line of the two yards.

Tara’s husband cut the grass every weekend. He trimmed it and edged it. It looked fantastic. After he cut it, he watered it and fertilized it. Susie’s husband only cut theirs when it grew so high he was afraid they’d be fined.

Susie needed groceries again. She wondered what Tara ate, she was thin but not too thin. Susie carried a few extra pounds. She exercised but it seemed it didn’t help much. Did Tara exercise enough? She supposed she did.

The day when Susie and her husband bought a pretty twin sleigh bed for their child was a happy one. It was soft white and pretty. She loved it. She asked if Tara would like to see it. Tara loved it too she said. They had coffee and Tara complimented it again. Susie knew Tara made better coffee but that day she didn’t care.

The next morning she and her daughter went over to Tara’s house for coffee. The girls (Tara had two daughters). Naturally she has twice as many daughters as me Susie thought to herself. The girls played and the mothers visited. They played dolls and video games. Aha, her girls have to share one video system Susie thought. The kids didn’t have any toy envy about that though.

After they left, Susie and her daughter chatted. The child told her that Tara’s two girl’s each had a sleigh bed in their room. Susie felt that old next door neighbor envy and it grew unbearable. She was glad Tara hadn’t bragged about it.

The next day, she took her daughter shopping at a big furniture store. Her daughter asked why they needed more furniture. She grew especially curious when they went to look at sleigh beds. She said she liked the one she had and didn’t want a different one. Susie responded by saying in a gruff voice that she was buying a sleigh bed for the spare room. It’s in case we have overnight company she told the little girl. By the next week, she too had two of the same style beds in her house. Tara had no clue how much next door neighbor envy Susie suffered from.