'Lead with kindness.' Woman writes letter to noisy neighbor and bakes him a cake, leading to new friendship

Hope Schreiber
·Writer
Candice Marie Benbow, with her neighbor Tommy. (Photo: Twitter)
Candice Marie Benbow, with her neighbor Tommy. (Photo: Twitter)

Kill them with kindness. Writer Candice Marie Benbow chose to approach a noisy neighbor with a warm, friendly letter, and to make the situation even sweeter, she baked him a cake.

While a noisy neighbor will typically bring out the worst in us (there’s a reason so many sitcoms feature characters banging a ceiling with a broomstick), Benbow took the high road — and it paid off.

On Dec. 15, Benbow shared on Twitter an image of a letter she penned to her downstairs neighbor, Tommy, who had a tendency to blast music until four in the morning.

“We haven’t formally met and I hate we’re doing so under these circumstances,” the letter begins. She goes on to explain that she expects him to come home and blast music, and she is somewhat appreciative of his dedication to “throwback” classics. Other times, she Googles lyrics and adds it to her own playlist. “To be fair, you’ve helped me catch a vibe.”

However, when the loud music continued well into the morning hours, she wrote “Last night … Fam, you tried it. You really, really did.”

Although Benbow was complaining about the outlandish choice of loud techno music to lull one to sleep (or rev up the party), she chose to approach it with kindness, instead of passive-aggressiveness like many are wont to do.

And the updates did not disappoint.

So why does Benbow’s neighbor Tommy blast his music daily in the first place? He’s a music video producer. “EVERYTHING makes sense now,” she tweeted. On top of that, Benbow learned that Tommy was experiencing his first holiday without his daughter, who died in a car accident.

“It was a sweet and gentle reminder that we never know what folks are going through and it is always best to lead with kindness. When we can extend grace, we really should,” she wrote.

Aww, let’s get this movie made!

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