Here's mud in your eye...

I live in a townhouse which is smack in the middle of a larger condo complex. As such our place is governed by the complex’s condo corporation.

S and I pay fees to gain access to the condo’s services and facilities such as snow removal, mailboxes, gym access and underground parking. The condo fees aren’t onerous but, sure as shit, every year they’re guaranteed to go up. (And yet try to book a party room for your fiance’s wedding shower and watch the machinery break down)

But what I really don’t like about the condo corp is how it embodies the worst aspects of a gated community. Last summer, the corp declared that all exterior doors would now be painted black, to keep visual look of the doors consistent with that of the railings and exterior light fixtures.

Ooooooookay.

This summer our exposed concrete wall has become a test canvas for the corp to experiment with finding the perfect shade of red for all the exposed concrete in the complex. (Incidentally our next door neighbour is the condo president which is why we got saddled with this particular honour)

As we own the townhouse, it bugs me that the corp is free to redecorate our entire exterior based on their bureaucratic group think. Um, the last time I checked we were paying the condo fees and should therefore be the final arbiters of what our own house looks like.

Do I really care if our door is black and our wall is red?

No. Not really. I think it’s an improvement to be honest.

But what if I didn’t like the new colour scheme? Then I’d be stuck with someone else’s design choices and a long uphill battle to preserve a status quo that’s already been changed.

What I care about is how someone else gets to make decisions that affect my property without even consulting me on it.

I’m tempted to paint our entire front porch neon orange, throw up some broken Christmas lights and maybe even throw out a pink flamingo or two in the front flowerbed, just to what would happen.

It may trigger an interesting conversation.