Encounters with Strangers & Personal Posted by JP Stormcrow, 03 Aug 2007 06:25 am

Encounters With Strangers (#6): Knock, Knock

It was an early Saturday morning more years ago than I care to remember. I eased the car, overburdened with a U-Haul trailer, into the parking lot of an all-night convenience store south of Memphis. Things had reached a critical point; driving all night on top of the cumulative effects of several months of emotional and mental stress had left me dangerously fatigued. I did not even think to ask my passenger to drive, we had passed that point months ago. Never a coffee drinker, I had partaken liberally of that foul brew - but something more was needed. Not prepared to seek more effective - but also more illegal - remedies, I brushed past the copies of Elvis’s will for sale and purchased several packs of cigarettes. Never a smoker, I had hit upon the dubious idea that the best plan was to chain-smoke the rest of the way to Ohio. The decision was about par for the course - to quote Richard Brautigan, “I still can’t figure out what I meant by living the way I did in those days.”

In any event, all reached Ohio safely, car and passenger were dropped off, driver and passenger bidding each other fond adieu. A blessed, but short night of sleep, an uncomfortable frazzled passive aggressive morning with the parents and two flight segments later I was back in Houston. Back where the next unsuccessful relationship, which had bumped up uncomfortably close to the end of the prior one, demanded attention at once on the far side of town. So it was an even more sleep-deprived, groggified shadow of a functioning human being that showed up Monday morning to go through the motions at work. But though the wheels of mindless work grind slow, they do in fact grind, and in time I headed home.

Home! Alone! The holy grail! “Home” at the time was a small apartment near downtown Houston into which I had moved but a short time earlier. Apart from the appliances belonging to the apartment people, it contained two lawn chairs, a mattress, clothes for one, a table made out of scavenged crates, books, records and a stereo. There was a can of peaches in the refrigerator - I hadn’t eaten well in a long time. But it was great! I was a king in his castle. I put a record on the stereo (I do wish I remembered what it was), cranked it up and plopped down on my lawn chair throne, exhausted and famished, but content. Mere minutes later a knock came upon the door. Getting up to answer it, I realized that my head really, really, really hurt, but I soldiered on. I opened the door to find two older women standing there. “Can you tell us where the manager’s …”, began one of them tentatively.

When I regained consciousness I found myself lying in the ashes of a small hibachi I kept outside the door. The two women were not in sight. If I had felt bad standing up, I felt ten times worse now, everything hurt. “I’m dying.” I thought. Vanity, stupidity and/or decency kicked in, and my immediate next thought was, “You can’t just die out here in public.” and I obligingly rolled into the apartment, reached up and slammed the door. I didn’t die of course, I recovered and went on to lead an appropriately consumero-normative lifestyle, thank God. But for a long time afterwards I would stop and ponder how the story read from the women’s point of view. I’m guessing that they abandoned the thought of seeking an apartment in that particular building, and I also suspect they didn’t look at anything too close by either. Did they feel any guilt at not staying around to help or see that I was OK? Maybe, who knows? (For all I know they got nervous and coldcocked me.) I don’t begrudge them their flight - well not too much anyway - I’m sure I looked the mess, appearing at the door with Jethro Tull? Pink Floyd? (I need to recover who the hell I was playing) booming in the background. I hope it didn’t modify their apartment search too radically, didn’t scare them back to one of the nameless suburban complexes which blighted vast swaths of Houston outside the I-610 loop. I don’t think about it too much anymore, but if I had died, then, boy would I have been pissed off.

*************
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Responses to “Encounters With Strangers (#6): Knock, Knock”

  1. on 03 Aug 2007 at 10:41 am 1. Seattle said …

    Wow. Reminds me of the hispanic co-worker from Mt Angel OR who, years ago, was suffering from kidney stones while working with me in a Seattle natural foods distribution company. A very pretty gay man, he had an kidney stone attack and went into the emergency room at Harborview for pain medication-where it was assumed he must be a drug addict.

  2. on 03 Aug 2007 at 10:47 am 2. JP Stormcrow said …

    Yeah, they might have thought that if they had gotten there just a few minutes earlier I would have come out with my belt around my arm.

  3. on 03 Aug 2007 at 11:13 am 3. Oaktown Girl said …

    HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SEATTLE! Good to see you here today.

    I have a birthday game planned in your honor: Name that tune/album that was playing on JP’s stereo when the visitors knocked on his door. It can either be the music you think might have been playing, the music you think should have been playing, or whatever.

    There are 2 categories as well - time (era/year) appropriate and non-era appropriate. (For example, if you think the most perfect song to have been playing happens to be from the 80’s).

  4. on 03 Aug 2007 at 11:44 am 4. JP Stormcrow said …

    Can I play?

    I think an appropriate song for my mental state** would have been “I’m Free” from Tommy, which I did own at the the time, but I don’t think I did anything that purposefully symbolic. Plus in those pre-shuffle days I used to be fairly dogmatic about respecting the album order, so if you are going for what I actually played go for leadoff song on an album - most likely something on the “heavy” side of 70s prog rock. (And my “passenger” just loooved Hall & Oates, so think of something along the lines of an anti-Hall & Oates. I was just coming around to the Ramones et al, but don’t think I owned any at the time, and “I Wanna Be Sedated”, which would have worked, was not yet out.)

    **I originally had a note at the top of this post indicating that it showed me as a bit of a jerk. However, upon being questioned, I realized that the sense of being a jerk that I associate with the story comes more from some parts of the “setup” that are left out to protect the semi-innocent and which show me in a less flattering light. But author’s prerogative wins out. Another game could be to fill in the less savory parts of the story… but then again, on second thought, nevermind!

  5. on 03 Aug 2007 at 12:06 pm 5. Kiera PSI said …

    I’ll play!

    I was thinking “Stairway to Heaven” and it getting just to the wailing end when he collapsed.

  6. on 03 Aug 2007 at 12:47 pm 6. James Killus said …

    I’m rooting for Talking Heads and “Psycho-killer.”

    I’m also thinking that this is one where not even my favorite all purpose excuse works very well: “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  7. on 03 Aug 2007 at 12:58 pm 7. Seattle said …

    LOL 13 years or so ago, I lived for 4 years in an apartment building that looked like once it might have been one of those cheap motels. Two stories, all doors on the same side, if you left your curtains open, all you neighbors got a clear view in through to your back bedroom. I used to call it “the shoebox.” All the most interesting neighbors I ever had I had at that apartment. The drugged up single mom with the two kids and her former heroine addict mother living in a second apt. The mentally ill man who lived above me for a while. The porn viewing gentleman who like to listen to his TV really loud at night-who I first thought had a really excellent sex life until I realized I was hearing exactly the same sequence of sounds over and over…. And the couple who lived next door who had a little girl. At some point they broke up and he was left there alone. This was the point he started to listening to certain albums really loudly. So I finally had to go over and say, “Hey man, I understand the whole cathartic music listening thing for a song or two, but the whole recording is too much….” His eyes were all blood shot, whether from crying or weed I’m not sure.

    My vote is “Love Hurts”.

  8. on 03 Aug 2007 at 1:17 pm 8. Oaktown Girl said …

    Another game could be to fill in the less savory parts of the story…

    Yeah, I certainly thought about that, but I wanted to keep it short, simple, and on the lighter side for Seattle’s Birthday game festivities (plus, I’m at work so I don’t have time to make my comments too detailed). But I’m all for filling in the “blackout” gap. That’s a whole weekend’s worth of fun right there. (Caution, JP - we know James enjoys writing fiction, and I happen to know that Kiera does too. Could get interesting).

    Kiera - I really love your music pick. Delightfully cheesy from overplay, and to have JP going belly-up just at the wailing climax is el-perfecto. All my ideas are much more mundane than that.

  9. on 03 Aug 2007 at 1:39 pm 9. Oaktown Girl said …

    James – thanks. I’m getting a good laugh trying to imagine how someone, no matter how intoxicated, could go from “It seems like a good idea now” to waking up face down in the ashes of a hibachi. Then again, I confess to having been deeply intoxicated enough to know that all kinds or crazy, insane shit seems like a “good idea at the time”. I imagine sustained, long-term fatigue and other stressors on the level JP is describing qualifies as “intoxicated enough”.

    JP – Am I right in guessing this was a watershed moment in your life?

    My mundane fill-in-the-blackout is that you tried to be polite and actually take the women to the manager’s office/apt, but you didn’t quite make it. They checked you to make sure you were still breathing, and then got the hell out of there.

  10. on 03 Aug 2007 at 2:21 pm 10. Seattle said …

    Dark Side of the Moon?

    Brain Damage

    And if the dam breaks open many years too soon
    And if there is no room upon the hill
    And if your head explodes with dark forebodings too
    I’ll see you on the dark side of the moon.

  11. on 03 Aug 2007 at 2:32 pm 11. JP Stormcrow said …

    JP – Am I right in guessing this was a watershed moment in your life?

    Yes, or at least in the middle of a watershed period. By many measures it was somewhat the bottom point of decline that had started about Sophomore year of college, and the beginning of a “recovery” to my current exalted plane of existence…

    “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

    Yes, a lot of things from that time period of my life don’t even pass that minimal retroactive justification. But as my favorite new apologist, Oaktown Girl, says, there were mitigating circumstances. (Self-induced every single one of them, however.)

    Actually I got a bit straightened out by the arrival some months later of a younger college friend who was a real mess compared to me, and who needed a place to hang. He was a wispy blond kid who was 20 or so but looked 12, we paid the woman who managed the place $20/month cash on the side since my lease was only for a “single” - I’m sure I can imagine what she imagined. (He was the most “hit upon” person I have ever seen when he lived there, he got so he didn’t want to walk alone to the store a block away for a gallon of milk.)

    He enrolled in courses at the U of H and got a job delivering the Wall Street Journal in the morning, he was a sub, so they would call about 3:00 AM every morning to tell him which route to do. I got to kind of like the rhythm of half-waking to the phone and then realizing it wasn’t for me and that I had several more hours of sleep.

    Hard to assess how I feel about the whole time period, a lot of growing up went on, but at some level it just seems that it was much harder than necessary. But I’m sure everyone has their equivalent (or equivalents.) Almost all of my friends at the time were taking “non-linear” paths, so it did not seem that unusual while it was happening.

  12. on 03 Aug 2007 at 4:16 pm 12. Seattle said …

    Human emotional development always seems to be a long hard haul. I’ve never heard anybody say, “Growing up was easy!” If I did, I’d figure they didn’t really grow up.

    But about these women who watched you pass out and left you there, I think there is no real reason for that. How difficult is it to call 911 or let the manager know that one of his inmates has collapsed? One night my neighbor went running by my place with a kitchen knife in one hand, screaming at her mother who had taken the grandkids into her place for their own safety. You can bet everyone in the apt complex was calling 911. It’s not that hard.

  13. on 03 Aug 2007 at 4:54 pm 13. James Killus said …

    Since the women were asking where the manager’s office was, notifying the manager might have been a little difficult, involving at the very least knocking on yet another door, and, well, who knows who would have answered that knock?

    It’s also possible that there was some retrograde amnesia involved on JP’s part. It’s not the most probably scenario, but it’s conceivable that he gave the women directions, watched as they left, then passed out when they were out of sight. Of course there’s the question of the noise involved; is it possible to knock over an hibachi quietly?

    Or maybe one of the women accidentally knocked it over and the ashes just looked so comfortable…

  14. on 03 Aug 2007 at 4:57 pm 14. Oaktown Girl said …

    No excuse for the women to have just left you there, JP.

    As for calling 911, I know as far as the very late 70’s, early 80’s, as a babysitter, I still had a list of separate emergency numbers to call for police, fire, ambulance, etc. And there was always the big ritual of making sure I had all that before the parents left for their outing.

    Here’s some interesting notes from wiki

    When the 9-1-1 system was originally introduced, it was advertised as the “nine-eleven” service. This was changed when some panicked individuals tried to find the “eleven” key on their telephones (seemingly amusing, but it is important to remember that in emergencies people can easily become extremely confused and irrational).
    ******
    In 1973, the White House urged nationwide adoption of 911. In 1999, President Bill Clinton signed the bill that designated 911 as the nationwide emergency number. Even though 9-1-1 was introduced in 1968, the network still does not completely cover some rural areas of the United States and Canada.

  15. on 03 Aug 2007 at 5:09 pm 15. Oaktown Girl said …

    Here’s some more birthday balloons for you, Seattle!
    Have a great one! It’s got to be a great year this year, what with being a full member in good standing in the WAAGNFNP!

    If I had any photoshop skills at all, I’d make you a pic of 3Tops or Astaroth in a party hat!

    Image Hosted by ImageShack.us

  16. on 03 Aug 2007 at 5:30 pm 16. Oaktown Girl said …

    Yes, James, I meant to mention this too: It’s possible JP was still on his feet for as long as the women were there, and they just gave up on him because he was making no sense. JP - did you ever ask the apt. manager about it? Or were you (understandably) too embarrassed to pursue it?

    (I know I’ve done a few embarrassing things in my day…)

  17. on 03 Aug 2007 at 7:31 pm 17. JP Stormcrow said …

    If I had any photoshop skills at all, I’d make you a pic of 3Tops or Astaroth in a party hat!

    MOJ:wish::JP:command.

  18. on 03 Aug 2007 at 8:17 pm 18. JP Stormcrow said …

    Quick response on several of the points raised, but am quite exhausted and if I were to have a repeat it’s not entirely clear if my family would just let me lay there… nah, they’d get tired of stepping over me pretty quick.

    As I said in the post, I am not too judgmental re: the two women. I am pretty sure I went down before speaking (but of course “unintentionally unreliable narrator” is a distinct possibility given the circumstances) Think about the suddenness, the door opens, you start to ask a question, and the person collapses. My personal “narrative of exoneration” has them coming back and seeing that I wasn’t where they had left me.

    I’ve never heard anybody say, “Growing up was easy!” If I did, I’d figure they didn’t really grow up.

    Good point. Just was a bit of a shock to me given my white bread background. And I should also point out that although I personally had next to nothing, I was in fact living a simulacrum of poverty since I had a stable middle-class family safety net. (For instance, I am pretty sure that I borrowed the money from my folks for the flight back.)

  19. on 04 Aug 2007 at 1:47 pm 19. Oaktown Girl said …

    Awww…look at birthday party 3Tops…so cute!
    Nicely done, JP.

  20. on 06 Aug 2007 at 9:23 am 20. Seattle said …

    Family safety nets are good. In my opinion, that’s the right kind of poverty. The difference between having a safety net and trying to be independent for the most part anyway, and truly being on your own which creates all sorts of insecurity and therefor misery. In my white bread naive opinion, we’d have a lot less homelessness if everyone had a family safety net. Not to say that I don’t know people who stretch the limit of family and friendships until you say to yourself, no wonder nobody in the family will loan X money anymore or give them a place to stay… Still, family safety net good, a gabillion 18 year olds tossed out to sink or swim, not good. So says Seattle. A theory I’ll personally be putting to the test in a few years…

  21. on 06 Aug 2007 at 12:21 pm 21. Oaktown Girl said …

    Re: what Seattle just said -
    It’s a hell of a lot harder these days for anyone to make it, just minimally, than it was just a few decades ago. The U.S. has not seen a raise in wages since 1972, and yet the cost of living has skyrocketed. Plus, jobs are getting more and more scarce. Even advanced degrees in technical fields are won’t spare you from outsourcing these days. And even if you are lucky enough to get one of the few union jobs left (good pay, decent benefits including a retirement plan), even then you face lay offs, as I can personally testify. Don’t even talk to me about basic medical care.

    In sum, getting tossed out at 18 (or any age) just ain’t what it used to be. And yet, we still are filled daily with propaganda about how the U.S. is “Greatest Country”.

  22. on 07 Aug 2007 at 10:50 am 22. JP Stormcrow said …

    Oaktown and Seattle,

    You both touch upon points that I struggle with as my own children come of age. And I often (too frequently probably) find myself looking back to my own (and various peers’) experience while I was that age. And a significant thing that “seems” different (not sure if it really is), is that I think we all assumed that things in general were moving upward, and that no matter how convoluted your path, you could catch on somehow, somewhere back then**. That might not really have been true then - but it definitely does not seem to be the feeling now. Currently it just does not seem that there is such a bright future except for the kids who stay the straight and narrow from the start. (I know this is not really true, but the whole zeitgeist seems quite different.)

    I do think that most in this country have internalized (rightly or wrongly) that we are hellbent for an us vs. them world and it has totally colored our perceptions and our decisions.

    **A caveat here is that I was “relatively” privileged coming of age in the 70s, so I could easily see my characterization of perception of opportunities at the time being angrily rejected by folks from the same period coming from a different background.

  23. on 07 Aug 2007 at 12:13 pm 23. Oaktown Girl said …

    And a significant thing that “seems” different (not sure if it really is)

    JP, either you are being far too kind/naive about where we are in this country, or too mired in relative privilege. I think it must be the former. There’s no “seems” about it. The facts and statistics are in. Cost of living increases (housing, college, medical, food, utilities, clothes, fares for public transit, auto maintenance and insurance, etc) compared to wages is out of this world. Union jobs are at an all-time low, corporate profits at an all-time high. Living wage jobs being shipped out of the country and not being replaced. Today drug and gang-related violence was unheard of in the 60’s and 70’s. And as the economy worsens for working people, crime goes up.

    And making it all worse, as people are forced to struggle more to get by, instead of coming together, the instinct (egged on by our corporate media) seems to be to hoard what little we have instead of fighting/working to make things better for everyone.

  24. on 07 Aug 2007 at 9:45 pm 24. JP Stormcrow said …

    JP, either you are being far too kind/naive about where we are in this country

    I was thinking more that I (and you) may have painted too rosy of a picture of the late 60s and 70s - there were some pretty severe issues then as well, and “opportunity” was probably not as widely available to all as I intimated.

  25. on 07 Aug 2007 at 10:18 pm 25. Oaktown Girl said …

    Naw, I have no rose-colored memories of the past. Times were tough, but they’re a hell of a lot tougher now is all I’m saying. I could go into details, but it’s too depressing.