Through the looking glass

I've mentioned in the past that when we bought our place it was supposed to be a "two year" starter condo. ... and then 2008 came. Five years later we're still in the two year starter with limited signs of relocating any time soon. It was fine when we moved in. The area wasn't ideal but it was in our price range and it had enough space. We were newly weds and it worked fine. As the girls came closer to arrival not only did the space issue start to concern us, but we suddenly started noticing another problem. ... our neighbors. It's not the adults that are the problem (although a few are less then ideal), it's mostly their kids. In the last five years they've gone from a multitude of little toddlers to a roaming pack of wild dogs, conjuring images of Lord of the Flies rather than elementary school students. There's never an adult present, they swear like seasoned sailors and they leave a wake of destruction in their path with trash strewn about, broken fixtures and someone always crying. We've made it our goal that the girls never interact with these children, we'd get out of here long before that possibility arrived. I'm afraid we are now at the threshold. The little girls in the pack wait for us to exit the building and then swarm us to say "hi", always commenting on shoes and hair. They're actually very sweet little girls (although I'm disturbed by the fact that most of their mouths are completely silver at 6 years old - seriously, it's called a tooth brush parents!), it's the boys that I really dislike. These little. ... ahem. ... boys curse to no end and they are out of control with their "playing". ... I've even seen one swinging away with a golf club and golf ball only about 5 yards from my front door, I've also seen them throw rocks at each other just to pass the time. Yesterday, after getting the girls out of the bath I heard a commotion out front. I went in to the living room to see two 8 year olds in a fist fight (again, no parents around) and the other kids gleefully egging them on. My girls plastered their faces to the window to watch, which upset me even more then the other's swelling faces and the five year old who shouted "kick his ass". I flung open my door and yelled "stop it right now! I am not going to allow this to go on in front of my home. If you need to do this you need to move it elsewhere. Do you really want to set this kind of example for my little girls to see?!" To which one of the fighters replied "whatever" then turned around and punched his opponent. I was mortified. Add to everything else, now it's evident that this grade schooler has zero respect for any adult, and I'm quite an imposing adult at that (6'3", 225lbs). I pulled my girls from the window and closed the blinds, but Arianna was adamant about watching and kept returning and pulling them back up. I finally moved them both in to their bedroom and closed the door. I could hear them outside for another 20 or 30 minutes, so we read books and listened to music until is subsided and then I put them to bed. When Gina made it home the first thing from my mouth is "we need to get out of here." I don't care what it takes. If we have to shack up elsewhere and rent this place out so be it. I'm not going to have my children associate with and by influenced by a bunch of other peoples parenting mistakes. And before it's suggested that I talk to the parents, I'd like to note that I have no clue who the parents are. As mentioned before I've never once (not in 5 years) seen a parent amongst the ruckus. This is not a world I'm willing to let my children walk through. God help me, I'm gonna find a way out of here. And I'm going to find it fast.