ANGELS IN THE SNOW (Part Two)

Everyone was there. Music was blaring, the bathtub was filled with ice and cans of beer, and all the furniture was sitting on the front lawn. As we entered the apartment, it began to snow. The place was filled with wall-to-wall people. Everyone we knew was there. W.S. headed for the bathroom to get a couple of beers.

I spotted Barry. He was wearing a Hawaiian shirt. “I see you traded in your Santa suit,” I said. “Can’t afford to go to Hawaii, so this was the next best thing,” he replied. “Where’s Brenda?” I asked. “She’s in the bathroom,” he replied. “I’m getting a little worried. She’s been in there along time. Do you mind checking on her?” I told him that Brenda was probably fighting her way through the crowd on her way back to him, but that I’d take a look. Using a New York elbow, I made my way to the bathroom. As I arrived, Rocky was going in and W.S. was coming out.

“Have you seen Brenda?” I asked. “Yes,” said W.S.  “She’s wearing a Hawaiian shirt?”  “Barry is wearing one too,” I said. W.S. replied, “Don’t they know it’s snowing outside?” “Well, did you see her?” I asked. “Yes,” he replied, pointing to the bathroom. “She’s sitting in there.” Rocky was coming out carrying two beers, and Guy was on his way in.

“Stop!” I shouted. “I think Brenda is in there.” I slowly opened the door and entered. Sure enough, Brenda was sitting on the toilet, her skirt discretely covering her knees and her hands covering her face. “Nice shirt,” I said. “Thank you,” she sniffled. “Barry is looking for you,” I said. “I’m never coming out of here,” she cried. “I am humiliated. I had to go to the bathroom. There’s no lock on the door, and everyone just kept coming in for beer. They didn’t even say, ‘Excuse me.’ They just kept coming.”

“Oh, never you mind.” I said. “I’m sure they didn’t even notice you.” “Everybody is going to laugh at me,” she said, as she stood up. “No they won’t.” I said.  “Just wash your hands, and let’s get out of here before they break down the door.” A long line of thirsty people burst into laughter as we exited.

The apartment was getting hot, so Travis opened the door, and we noticed that what had started as snow and sleet had now turned into a full-fledged blizzard. We decided it was time to leave. As we slid our way to the car, Rocky said, ”Does anyone have any matches? The door lock might be frozen.” I dug some matches out of my purse. Rocky warmed the key, and after several tries was finally able to open the car door. We were grateful that we had left the party just in time.

The next day, I called to thank Travis and Guy. Travis answered the phone. “Why did you leave so early?” he asked. “We were worried about the blizzard,” I said. “What happened to your furniture?” “It’s still outside,” he said. “We are waiting for it to thaw out. Had to sleep on the floor last night, and I can’t get any clean underwear because the dresser drawers are frozen shut” “How long did the party last?” I asked. He replied, “A few people couldn’t find their cars under the snow, so they decided to stay over. They are digging out now. Do you and W.S. want to come over? Snarky is going to scramble some eggs.” “No thanks,” I replied. “Just tell Snarky that I’m in the kitchen scrambling eggs right in the pan---just the way he told me to. It will make his day.”

Not long after the party, Guy married the beautiful graduate student, and nine months later they had identical twin baby girls. Whenever anyone asked Guy which baby he was holding, he’d say, “I don’t have a clue. Ask another question.”---And he still got away with it!

Esther Blumenfeld, CROSSING WITH THE BLUE LIGHT, Blumenfeld c. 2006

ANGELS IN THE SNOW (Part One)

Travis and Guy were housemates. Guy was a charming fellow and the darling of the faculty. Rumor has it that when asked a question during his thesis defense, he had no answer. So, he smiled at the four professors on his committee, and said, “I don’t have the answer to that one, but would you like to hear this one?” W.S. said, “If I had tried that trick, I probably would be banished to scholar’s purgatory forever. But---it’s a ‘Guy Thing.”’ Guy had a beautiful girlfriend who was also a graduate student.

Travis was the third Travis in his familial line, and he drove a red Corvette. His fiancé had a public relations job with the Campbell Soup Company, and spent much of her time in Alaska developing a healthy eating program involving soup. “How hard can it be to get people to eat soup in Alaska?” I asked W.S. “It stays dark a long time there in the winter,” he said. “Maybe they get confused and want to eat soup for breakfast.”

There was a third fellow who shared the rent, but I only met him once. They called him “Snarky.” I don’t know if that was his real name, or derived from Snark, but he was a strange little man who spent most of his time in a laboratory growing disgusting things in Petri dishes. When I met him, he said, “I’ll bet you don’t know how to make perfect scrambled eggs.” “I’ll bet I don’t care,” I responded.

However, he ignored me and said, “You crack the eggs and put them into a bowl. Then you put a drop of water into the bowl before beating the eggs. Then you put them into a pan. Pull them gently away from the side of the pan. You don’t scramble them in the pan.” “What happens if I skip the water, skip the bowl, crack the eggs right into the pan and scramble them, and they don’t know I’ve done it?” I asked. “They won’t be perfect,” he smirked. “Then I will just eat them before they start criticizing me,” I said. It was at this point, I realized that Snarky was dead serious about his eggs, because he just snorted and walked away.

When W.S. joined me, I asked, “What’s with Snarky?” “All I know is that he pays his rent on time and stays out of the way when Travis and Guy throw a party, and that’s good enough for them. There was always room for one more guest at a Travis and Guy party, and the festivities usually lasted until they ran out of beer or the neighbors called the police---whichever came first.

The semester was over; winter break had begun, so it was time for a party. Rocky and Velma picked us up because they wanted to see our apartment. When Rocky heard that we lived at the Princess Garden Apartments, he said, “Are you living in an apartment or a fairy tale?” “Neither,” said W.S. “We are living in a Marshall Fields gift box.” “What do you mean?” asked Velma. “I was trying to hang a picture before you got here, and the hammer went right through the wall,” he said. “These walls are like cardboard.”

“No,” I added. “They’re not like cardboard. They are cardboard.” “But,” said W.S. “we found out that the gift boxes from Marshall Field match the walls. So whenever there’s a hole in the wall, we just glue a piece of box over the hole and you can’t tell the difference.”

Rocky and Velma spent the next few minutes trying in vain to find the sections of wall we had patched with parts of gift boxes, but the little specks in the pattern made Velma nauseous, so we decided to leave for the party, which was already in full swing when we arrived.  Everyone was there. Music was blaring, the bathtub was filled with ice and beer cans, and all of Travis and Guy’s furniture was sitting on the front lawn. “Had to make room for all of the people,” Travis explained. “What if it rains?” I asked. “It won’t rain,” said Travis. “It’s too cold for rain.” He was right.

As we entered the apartment, it began to snow. (To be continued---).

Esther Blumenfeld, CROSSING WITH THE BLUE LIGHT, Blumenfeld c. 2006.

LOWER THE MOAT---WE'RE HOME (Part Two)

One day, when the scythe man arrived at the Princess Garden Apartments, our neighbor began screaming, “Stop him! Stop him! Don’t let him start chopping the grass, I’ve lost my toddler.” We knew that things had gotten out-of-hand when the grass was taller than a child, but we linked arms and discovered the tike asleep in the grassland not far from his front door.

No one wanted to mess with the landlord. No one had ever seen the landlord. It was rumored that he wasn’t a very nice man, and had business connections with some other---not very nice men---so no one ever complained about anything. We tenants just mailed our rent checks on time and skipped through our meadow on the way to campus.

I was curious about our landlord. “Have you ever met him?” I asked W.S. “Nope,” he mumbled. “Surely, when you rented the apartment you must have seen him?” I said.  “Nope,” he answered. I said, “How can that be?” W.S. replied, “I just called him on the phone. He sent me the paperwork. I signed it and that was that. Never met him. Never saw him.” So, I figured, our landlord was going to remain a mystery man forever, and I would probably never talk with him. But, that was before I knew that even when something is not probable--- anything is possible, and the possible was about to happen.

One winter morning, I awoke, crawled over W.S., and stepped onto the floor with my bare feet. “Oh,” I exclaimed, “the floor is so nice and warm.” W.S. rolled over, sat up, stretched, got out of bed and proceeded toward the bathroom. “What do you mean warm?” he shouted. “The floor isn’t warm. It’s hot!” I followed him into the bathroom and he was right. Not only was the floor hot, it was getting hotter.

 “I think you’d better call the landlord.” W.S. suggested. I said, “Why me?” He lovingly replied, “Because I have to get to class, and he probably won’t kill a woman.” So I called the landlord. The phone rang once. He picked up and said, “Yeah?” Taken aback, I replied, “Yeah.” “Who is this?” he growled. I said, “This is the tenant in the end apartment. The floor is hot, and I think maybe you’d better come check it out before we burn our feet,” and I hung up.

When I returned from campus that evening, a crew of workmen was digging a huge trench around the place. “What’s going on?” I asked W.S. “Is the landlord digging a moat?” “No.” he answered. “It’s a broken water line. You saved him big bucks with your phone call.”

During dinner, the phone rang. I answered, “Hello.” “What can I do for you?” said the man on the other end of the line. I had no idea who was calling, so I said, “What do you want to do for me?” He replied, “I’ll have somebody cut your grass,” and then he hung up.

I think it was the landlord calling, because from that day on, ours was the only apartment with a manicured lawn. It looked a little off-balance compared with the rest of the place, but no one had the guts to complain.

Esther Blumenfeld

CROSSING WITH THE BLUE LIGHT, Blumenfeld c. 2006

LOWER THE MOAT---WE'RE HOME (Part One)

The dreaded day arrived when our clogging neighbor’s back healed, and she returned to her nightly overhead thumping. Our lease was up for renewal, and the landlord had decided to raise our rent beyond what we could afford. Although we dreaded the thought, we knew it was time to pack up and move again.

The apartment situation had gotten worse. The places we looked at were either too expensive or too dreadful to contemplate. Everyday after work, I packed a few boxes of our meager belongings, but had no idea where we were going to live. We had to give a one month vacate notice, and our situation was getting desperate.

One day, W.S. announced, “This is ridiculous. I am going to drive around and find us a place to live. If an old lady can live in a shoe, certainly I can find us someplace.” “I’m not living in footwear,” I shouted as he drove away. Three hours later, my hero returned and announced triumphantly, “I found us a place!”

So began our adventure at the Princess Garden Apartments on Kingdom Drive. The Princess Garden Apartments didn’t start out as apartments. The owner built the 20-unit strip as a motel, but when the neighbors in the residential neighborhood took him to court because of a zoning violation, he transformed the motel into apartments. Fortunately, W.S. arrived the day an end unit became available, and he grabbed it.

Kingdom Drive was a short street that dead-ended at the Princess Garden Apartments. Each apartment had a little walkway that led to the front door. W.S. warned me, “The rooms are kind of small, but it’s cozy,” as we stepped into the apartment. On the left was a living room big enough for two chairs and a coffee table; on the right was a kitchen that contained a very small bar sink, an even smaller stove, and a baby refrigerator. The bathroom had a toilet, a shower and a Lilliputian sink.

“Wait until you see the bedroom and study,” said, W.S. Actually, the bedroom was big enough for a double bed---assuming whomever slept next to the wall didn’t mind crawling over the person sleeping next to the entrance. And, technically, it wasn’t two rooms. It was one small room separated by a louvered wall, so when the light was on in the “study,” it gave the illusion of sleeping in a room with bars---kind of like being in a cozy prison cell. We squeezed a desk, a card table chair, a small television set and a battered Salvation Army sofa into that room.

“It’s stuffy in here,” I said. “Please open the window.” “Can’t, W.S. replied. “What do you mean, by ‘Can’t’” I asked. “They don’t open,” he replied. “But we can open the doors.” Turns out that our former motel-now-apartment had long-lasting, sturdy, inoperative Thermo pane windows, but it did have a front door and a back door. With all that said, it was, however, a cute little place and very quiet. Our neighbors were all graduate students whose main objective was to finish their course work, graduate, and escape.

The landlord never came around, not even to cut the grass, which grew as tall as a field of wheat. Occasionally, he’d send someone around to hack it down with a scythe. W.S. loved to sit amidst the stalks of grass, book in hand, waving at passing cars shouting, “Turista! Turista!”

One day when the scythe man arrived, our neighbor began screaming, “Stop him! Stop him! Don’t let him start chopping the grass. I’ve lost my toddler.”

Esther Blumenfeld (To be continued---)

CROSSING WITH THE BLUE LIGHT, Blumenfeld, c. 2006

JOINED AT THE HIP

Brenda and Barry wore matching navy-blue windbreakers with detachable hoods. If he had his hood up, you could be sure that hers would be up on her head and firmly tied under her chin. They held hands and walked lockstep wherever they went. As a matter of fact, Brenda told me, “We do everything together.” I didn’t care that she insisted on sitting next to him at my dinner table, or that they answered questions in unison, but it was her tone of superiority that irritated me, because W.S. and I knew we’d go nuts if we had to do “everything” together.

After dinner, she joined me in the kitchen as I was making coffee, and I spilled some grounds on the floor. “Don’t you hate it when that happens?” I asked, wiping up the spill. “Oh, that never happens to us when we make coffee,” she replied. “You make coffee together?” I said. “We do everything together,” she smirked. Then she began the mantra of togetherness; “We do dishes together. We do laundry together. We clean house together. We grocery shop together. We bank and post office together. We pay bills together.” I interrupted, “You don’t go to classes with him, do you?” “No,” she replied, “but I bring him his lunch and we eat together.

“Come on, Brenda,” I teased, “surely, there’s something you do on your own.” “Not really,” she said, “but,” she whispered, “He is going to do something without me.” Relieved, I asked, “And what’s that?” “You can’t tell anyone,” she said. “Promise, and I’ll tell you.” “Okay,” I won’t tell anyone except W.S., because I don’t keep any secrets from him, but you don’t have to worry because it’s exams week and he never listens to me during exams week.” “Well, you know,” she began hesitatingly, “that Barry’s father is a rabbi.” “Yes,” I replied wondering what this has to do with anything.

“Is Barry going home to visit his parents without you?” I prodded. “No.” she replied, “He wouldn’t do that!” “Then what is it?” I asked, running out of patience. “He’s going to be Santa Claus.” I looked at her. “We need the money. The department store is hiring for Christmas. Barry will have time between semesters, so he’s going to be Santa Claus.” “And you couldn’t do this with him.” I said. “I tried.” she sadly replied, “but they weren’t hiring any more elves.” She brightened when I said; “You can always go sit on his lap if you miss him.”

A few weeks later, we spotted Brenda and Barry strolling across campus. They were still wearing those windbreakers, but it was a nice day so their hoods were down. “So,” I said, conveniently forgetting my promise, “how was the Santa gig?” Brenda gave me a dirty look, but Barry just laughed and said, “It was fun. The kids were cute. I only got spit-up on twice. I did have one unusual experience.”

W.S. perked up, “What was that?” “A mother brought her little boy for a photo-op with Santa. He sat on my lap, and I gave him the usual, ‘Ho, Ho, Ho, and how old are you?’ and he said, ‘I am five years old.’ ‘And have you been a good little boy this year?’ I asked. He looked at me and hesitatingly said, ‘Yes.’ And then I asked him what he wanted me to bring him, and he listed a dump truck, a football and some game I had never heard of---and some books. ‘His mother kept saying, ‘Morris, smile for the picture,’ but the kid wouldn’t smile, so I whispered, ‘Is there something you’d like to tell Santa. You know you an tell me anything.’ The kid hesitated, looked at his mother and whispered into my beard, ‘Santa, I’m Jewish.’ ‘That’s okay, kid, I replied, so am I.”’ Barry told us that the kid had a big grin on his face, his Mama was happy, and Santa had earned enough money to buy a couple of matching parkas for winter.

I wondered, years later, when Brenda was in labor giving birth to her third child, what she really thought of all that “togetherness.”

Esther Blumenfeld

CROSSING WITH THE BLUE LIGHT, Blumenfeld c. 2006