There, well within a metre of our small caravan, was a big, tall motorhome. From inside our van the motorhome's white wall filled our windows, so close it seemed to have a presence inside the van. Over many years of caravanning and camping we'd seen people set up unnecessarily close to us and others but never this close.

The motorhome had been driven in rather than reversed onto its site, as is usual, so that its awning was on the other side rather than facing us and providing a buffer, and while the owner was still setting up it seemed to me that anyone so impervious to their impact on others would be unlikely to accede to a request to move over.

First, my wife and I decided in whispers, we should find out how long they were staying. We, too, had arrived just that day and we were to be there for six days, so we could cope with one or two days of white wall. So next door I went, gave my neighbourly spiel and learnt they were booked in for two days.

We could handle that, and to help us handle it more easily we were closing the curtains on that side when we heard a strange whirring noise from the motorhome. Oh no, heading our way was a slide-out, and while my wife frantically wound in our opened windows on that side I raced next door. Stop stop, I cried above the noise, I'm worried your slide out is going to hit our van. It's alright, they said, their slide-out didn't slide out far, a comment that showed an awareness of the proximity. Perhaps you could have reversed in, I said as gently as I could.

He didn't reverse in, the old bloke told me aggressively, because he decided to drive in and he was happy with the result. He had no idea, I replied, and he told me he did. Hopeless, I said as I left.

Minutes later as we left to visit an old friend my wife asked the park manager to look at the situation at our site, her first complaint ever to a park manager, and on our return Old Bloke Next Door had moved his motorhome over, under the instruction of the manager.

Unbeknownst to the park manager, we learnt later, the motorhome had been moved only half a metre, and so we packed up, hooked up and moved our caravan several metres over, rearranging the spaces for van, awning and vehicle. Problem solved, and it's what we should have done at the outset. Interestingly, my wife heard his wife berating him as I moved our van, telling him that he knew it was wrong to park where he did.

I've been reviewing what I did and what I should have done in this dispute, because conflict resolution is not my strongest attribute. Over the years as a commentator and columnist I was involved in conflict often enough but the difference was that others were in conflict with me, not me with them, and I found no difficulty in explaining why I'd written or not written something or other.

Conflict outside work is different, and I have a good deal to learn. I'm reluctant, though, to learn from friends who did assertiveness training a couple of decades ago, because their formula for asserting that would make the rest of us wince when we saw it in action.

First, they would thank the target of their assertion for being kind enough to listen, second they'd tell the target that they were unhappy, third they would state why they were unhappy, fourth they would spell out the solution, fifth they would thank the target effusively in anticipation of his or her co-operation.

How would that have gone over? I'd have thanked Old Bloke Next Door for listening, I'd have told him that my wife and I were pissed off, I'd have told him we were pissed off because his motorhome was too close to our caravan, I'd have told him the problem could be resolved by him reversing his van like everyone else had onto the other side of his site, and I'd have thanked him so very, very much for his extraordinary co-operation.

My asserting friends would stay on song in the face of provocation, and that's where I came unstuck.

I'd resolved to stay calm, although that began to unravel when the slide-out was heading our way. Still, that was alarm, not anger. But my anger escaped when the Old Bloke Next Door responded aggressively, and that was a mistake.

Telling him he had no idea and that he was hopeless was also a mistake, although I give myself a credit here for not swearing, not raising my voice and smothering the outbreak quickly. Still, I should have commented on only the issue, not the man.

If politics is the art of the possible, then so must be conflict resolution, and I realised early that Old Bloke Next Door packing up and reversing his motorhome onto the other side of his site was not going to happen. I should have realised earlier that what was achievable was me packing up and moving, and we should have done that sooner. It was a better result than our decision to put up with the problem quietly, as it turned out.

We rarely complain or protest, but just maybe there is a time for overt anger, for lots of noise and letting the victim loose. Shouldn't victims be entitled to let it all hang out?

Old Bloke Next Door, by the way, has decided to be friendly and we're being civil. Damning him with faint friendliness.

Jeff Corbett writes for the Newcastle Herald. Contact the writer: jeffcorb@gmail.com

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