Instead, I found the HOA president smashing my property while standing on a ladder she had taken from beside my garage.
I grabbed the wooden baseball bat leaning against the wall near the garage entrance.
It belonged to my daughter.
She used it for batting practice, and I'd been meaning to put it back in the sports equipment rack.
I didn't stop to think.
I ran outside.
"JUDITH! GET OFF MY HOUSE!"
She looked down.
For a moment, her expression changed.
Then she raised the hammer again.
"This camera is illegal!" she shouted. "I've told you to remove it!"
I stopped beside the ladder.
"You're destroying private property!"
Judith laughed.
"You've been spying on the community!"
She swung the hammer once more.
The camera's remains broke away from the wall.
Fragments struck the aluminum rungs and scattered onto the concrete.
I felt a burst of anger unlike anything I'd experienced in years.
"PUT THE HAMMER DOWN!"
Judith looked at me.
Her smile returned.
"Too late, sweetheart. No camera, no proof!"
Then she laughed again.
I swung the baseball bat against the ladder's lowest metal rung.
The impact made a deafening clang.
The ladder rattled.
Judith gasped and grabbed both side rails, suddenly terrified that she'd lose her balance.
The hammer slipped from her fingers.
It bounced off a lower rung and fell onto the grass.
For one horrible instant, I realized what I'd just done.
She was almost twelve feet above the ground.
Whatever she'd done to my camera, a falling ladder could seriously injure her.
I dropped the bat and grabbed both side rails, holding the ladder steady.
"Don't move!" I shouted.
Judith stared down at me.
Her face was pale.
For several seconds, neither of us spoke.
Then she whispered, "You tried to kill me."
I looked up.
"No. And I'm keeping the ladder steady. Now climb down carefully."
Her eyes narrowed.
"You hit the ladder with a baseball bat!"
"I know. I shouldn't have done that. I'm holding it still now."
She looked toward the broken camera.
Then back at me.
For a moment, her fear seemed to disappear beneath a familiar expression of contempt.
"You're going to regret this."
I took a controlled breath.
"Come down, Judith."
She began descending.
One rung.
Then another.
Her floral dress brushed against the aluminum rails.
By the time she reached the ground, she was breathing heavily.
I stepped aside.
She snatched her handbag from the grass and turned toward me.
"That camera was recording people without their permission."