The teenager next door practices drums after school, exactly when I work from home. What is a fair request?

At 3:47 most afternoons, the first drum fill comes through the wall behind my desk.

The teenager next door is good enough that I can tell the practice is structured. There are warmups, repeated sections, pauses, then the same difficult part again. If this were happening at midnight, I would know what to say. It happens between roughly 3:45 and 5:15 p.m., which is a completely normal time for a high school student to be awake and making music.

It is also the last ninety minutes of my workday.

I take customer calls from a small back bedroom because it is the only room with a door. The houses are close, and their garage faces that room. Headphones remove some of the sound for me, but my microphone still picks up the kick drum. Last week a client stopped mid-sentence and asked whether construction was happening.

I have met the parents several times. They are friendly, and the teenager once carried a heavy planter to our porch without being asked. I do not want to arrive with the message that a kid’s serious hobby matters less than my laptop job. I also cannot keep apologizing for percussion on calls.

My first thought was to ask for a fixed practice window after 5:30. That solves my problem neatly and may create a new one for their dinner, homework or family schedule. My second thought was to share the two or three call blocks that matter most each week, but my calendar changes and I do not want them waiting for weekly instructions from me.

There may be physical fixes. The kit could perhaps move to the far side of the garage, or we could test whether closing one door changes what reaches my room. I do not know enough about drums or their house to prescribe a solution. I only know that the current setup lands inside my work calls.

The emotional complication is that daytime noise feels less legitimate to complain about. Every version of the conversation begins in my head with, “I know you are allowed to…” That sounds defensive before anyone has disagreed.

I am thinking of asking the parent whether we can do a ten-minute sound test: someone plays while I stand in my office, then we compare a couple of locations or door positions. If none of that helps, we could discuss a predictable quiet period rather than a ban.

Is that collaborative, or am I turning my neighbor into an acoustic experiment because I chose to work at home? What would be a fair outcome when both activities are reasonable and the timing is the conflict?