Judith

What's supposed to be my room is still uninhabitable, so I slept in the guest room. It got kinda cold overnight, and Judith had thoughtfully put some extra blankets on the chair, but I was too lazy to spread one out. When I woke up, a second blanket had been neatly spread over me.

Judith did it, I assume. Can't imagine it was Cy or Lugosi. It was a nice thing for her to do, but also… when the door is closed, the door should stay closed.

♦ ♦ ♦

When Judith was up, at noon or so, we went to breakfast at the east bay's finest dyke café, the Brick Hut, and shared a giant pile of healthy hotcakes made of wheat and corn, topped with cranberries, blueberries, spicy apples, walnuts, and a couple slices of orange. Despite being good for ya, it wasn't bad.

With coffee, milk, and some grainy side dish, the tab was close to twenty bucks, which is way beyond my budget, but Judith paid, so no complaints. We talked about bedroom boundaries, and I had to say it twice, but the rule will be: Knock before entering, and no sneaking in, even to tuck me under a binky.

♦ ♦ ♦

Then Judith went to the dentist, while I came home and swept and mopped the newly-cleared second bathroom. Hung a sign on the bathroom door, "Now open for your business," and this place that used to have four flatmates and one john now has five and two.

♦ ♦ ♦

When she got back, Judith and I went shopping for a few groceries and sundries, to three stores within five blocks of each other. It took nearly three hours.

I'm beginning to notice that she's a time-eater. At our third stop, the pet supply store, she kept changing her mind about which doggy toys to buy for Lugosi, and she wasn't changing her mind in the aisles, she was changing her mind at the register. If I hadn't started complaining about it I think we'd still be standing there.

She's a character, for sure. Things like this afternoon ought to be aggravating, and soon enough I'm sure it will be, but it's new to me so it's mostly just amusing. I'll talk to Judith about it, same as we talked about the blanket.

She's hard to be angry at, even when she deserves it. Even after wasting ten minutes of the sales clerk's time at the pet supply shop, he was laughing and it seemed to be genuine, and he gave her some free samples of cat food.

As the sun was setting and we were still out shopping when I wanted to be eating a sandwich in bed and unwinding, she was still making me laugh, too. Pretty soon, I'm pretty sure she'll start driving me nuts, but I have many years experience dealing with nuts, and I can deal with Judith.

♦ ♦ ♦

When we got back, she immediately started kicking up a flurry of dust sorting through stuff and hauling things out of my future bedroom, and she was mostly working alone. She hollered for help lugging some of the big stuff so I came and helped, but same as yesterday, I didn't help much. 

It's body chemistry: If I get up at 6AM, by 8PM I'm out of energy and my day is finished. She gets up at noon, lollygags until sunset, and then wants to get things done in a hurry.

There is no hurry, though. I'm in the guest room for now, and it's OK. I miss my comfy blankets, smelly pillows, and clothes that need laundering, but the typewriter's plugged in. Anywhere I can write, I'm at home. Mostly.

♦ ♦ ♦

Have I conveyed the hugeness of this place? And the messiness?

Sometimes I call it a house, because it feels like a house — a big house — but it's an apartment with seven bedrooms (I finally counted them). Four rooms are occupied, and the other three are full of everything that could fit through the door.

The house/apartment is a great space, all on the second floor of an otherwise empty commercial building. The flat is structurally sound, but it's a complete catastrophe of junk, books, trash, dog toys, and dog hair everywhere. Dunno where I could stash anything of mine if I brought more stuff over from Frisco; there's not an inch of empty floor space in any of the rooms, except maybe in Cy's room or Joe's.

I'm not a neat guy, so no complaints about the mess. My room at Pike & Terry's place in San Francisco is just about as bad. Everywhere else I've lived, though, even at Pike's apartment, everything outside my bedroom door has always been basically presentable. This place is an obstacle course, everywhere. You have to twist like a disco dance just to walk down the hall.

I type that smiling, though. I'm going to be right at home here, soon as I get settled into what'll be my own room, with my own stuff. And maybe with a lock on the door.

From Pathetic Life #13
Thursday, June 22, 1995

This is an entry retyped from an on-paper zine I wrote many years ago, called Pathetic Life. The opinions stated were my opinions then, but might not be my opinions now. Also, I said and did some disgusting things, so parental guidance is advised.

Pathetic Life
← PREVIOUS          NEXT →

itsdougholland.com
← PREVIOUS          NEXT →