Mending Walls, Building Fences

Have you ever read Mending Wall by Robert Frost? It's a great poem to read at this time of year -- when we have just done that - built a fence and a tall one (6 ft) at that! And I wonder if this fence will make us better neighbours? Will we still chat with the little girls next door and get to know the family a little better? 

In the poem, the author wonders if it's true that 'good fences make good neighbours' and why people put up fences when there's really nothing to keep in or out. His neighbour obviously wants to keep the fence up between their properties. Here's an excerpt from the poem..

He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.'
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it 
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down.'  I could say ‘Elves’ to him,
But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
He said it for himself.  I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.'

Well, one good reason for putting up a good solid fence between our yards is keeping a good separation between the neighbour's bull mastiff (who is not friendly towards us at all, although we've made effort) and this:

Little Enzo will be staying with us for a week, and maybe longer. He is the cutest little thing and I might have the option to adopt him from my sister. Small chance, because I'm pretty sure he is growing on her more each day!. When I visited my sis a few weeks ago, Enzo and I became fast friends. We shall see what transpires. 

Do you have a (substantial) fence between you and your neighbours? Has that been a good thing?