Reading the signals

My new friend Bill at the trailer park has taken a shine to me, it seems. Last week, we rode bikes in companionable silence in the gloaming. I knew it wouldn’t last. What is it with guys? Why can’t friendship be enough? Along the ride, Bill invited me on a date to see the Beach Boys in November at some casino thirty minutes south of here. I said I would think about it. When we got back to the trailer, I put the bike into the back of my car.

“Whoa, muscles,” he said. I ignored the comment. He continued, “I was wondering, why do you wear your hair so short?”

Part of me suspected Bill was consolidating his possession of me but I didn’t want to acknowledge it openly. Wouldn’t I feel stupid if I came right out and said, “Hey Bill, it seems like you are coming on to me. Is that what is actually happening?” and he said, “What? No, what gave you that idea?” and then I would be like, “Oh, sorry, my mistake.” Instead, flustered, I lamely explained my hair challenges.

“Oh, I thought you might have had cancer.”

“No, no cancer.”

He couldn’t help himself. He had to try again. What is with guys? He said, “Say, have you ever considered wearing glasses with smaller lenses?”

At that point, I began to exit my body. Ever mindful to maintain the polite veneer, I tried to explain my eyeglass and vision challenges. Meanwhile, I regressed to age eighteen, imagining I was hearing my father’s voice suggest in a perfectly reasonable tone, “Why don’t you wear some of those nice Ship ‘n’ Shore slack outfits?” The implication was clear: nobody will love you if you look the way you do.

You probably don’t know this about me. I used to be a fashion designer. I was an artist and a writer from a young age but I also had an interest in clothing as a form of self-expression. In elementary school, I applied the sewing skills I learned in 4-H to make A-line skirts and cotton jumpers. In high school, I adapted Butterick patterns to make hot pants and prom dresses. In college, after my art school friends convinced me painting was an obsolete art form, I switched my major to graphic design, which overlapped into fashion illustration. My interest in clothing design led me to Los Angeles in 1977.

I went to fashion design school in Los Angeles and learned to make patterns. I opened a funky custom clothing studio in West Hollywood. Even though I despised the tedium of sewing, for ten years, I made all kinds of clothes for all kinds of people. I made costumes for television commercials and sitcoms. I made costumes for movie characters you have never heard of. I dressed a few stars . . . Alice Cooper, Jon Anderson, Madeline Kahn. I made suits and hats. As Rome was burning, I made prom dresses, wedding dresses, and bridesmaid dresses, and then in 1989 it all imploded in a fireball of unsecured debt.

You would not know it to look at me now but I once had style. Oh sure, most of the time I dressed like a slob. I hate to sew, remember? However, when I needed some fancy outfit for an event hosted by my nouveau riche quasi-inlaws, I somehow managed to conjure up outfits that garnered surprised compliments. Oy, that goyim can really sew!

Now that I’m older, I don’t care how I look, which is a much more peaceful way to live. In addition, I am used to living alone, taming my hair with hedge clippers and eschewing bras. Nobody cares. My friends appreciate me as I am. That is why Bill’s comment caught me off guard.

Now I face a dilemma. How much do I want Bill’s friendship? Should I laugh at his jokes, listen to his stories, and gaze at his overbite with charmed admiration? Should I ride in his car to the Beach Boys concert, throwing Covid caution to the wind and ignoring the fact that I am in an unfamiliar city with no easy way to get home if the date goes sideways?

Bill talks about himself but has yet to express any interest in me. Not once has he asked me who I am or what I believe in. I would have thought his kids would have Googled me by now to let their father know what a creative wackjob I am and if I’m likely to be out to get his money.

I don’t need another friend, not that kind of friend. I’ve had friends like that, the ones who do all the talking and none of the listening. I hate to assume he’s just a lonely horny old man looking for a companion and eventually a caregiver, but it’s a possibility. I hate to say it could just be a guy thing. He’s of a certain generation, almost old enough to be my father’s generation. I don’t think anyone who knew my father well would say he treated women with true respect and equality.

When I was younger, I didn’t know how to say no. I didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. I got into some sad situations because I just wanted to be loved. Now I don’t care. I know I’m loved. I also know I was not put on this planet to meet someone else’s needs at the expense of my own. Not my job. And what the heck! I am not in dating mode. Been there, done that, don’t see myself doing that ever again.

Looks like I need to muster my courage for the talk. Let’s see, how should it go? Bill, when you suggested I should consider wearing glasses with smaller lenses . . . I want to say, what the hell were you thinking? Where do you get off, judging my appearance, as if you have jurisdiction over how I look? Bugger off, you and the saggy old horse you rode in on.

Oops, no, I would not say that. Let me try again. I could say . . . gosh, Bill, it sounds like you have an opinion on my appearance. Perhaps you think I would be happier if I looked different in some way? Because of course I know that you want me to be happy, and being different is not the path to happiness, is it? Maybe you think a woman’s place is to . . . No wait, my blood is starting to boil. Dammit, I wish I could say this stuff no longer has power over me, but clearly I would be lying.

No, let me try this again. Bill, when you suggested I should consider wearing glasses with smaller lenses, I may have missed an opportunity to tell you about myself. It’s true I wear short hair because it is convenient and I wear these glasses because they are what I have. But Bill, if you want to be friends with me, you will need to accept me as I am. I like to be different sometimes. Tomorrow I may show up bald with even bigger glasses. If you want to be my friend, you need to be okay with that. Because true friendship is not based on appearances. And oh, by the way, in case you were wondering, I’m a lousy cook and housekeeper, I hate to be touched, I eat onions and broccoli for breakfast, and I pick my teeth with toothpicks. Just so you know.

Something like that. What do you think? I’ll work on it.

Here’s an update from tonight. I just got home. I’m a bit peeved. First, I am chagrined to report, I failed to have the talk. Bill invited me into his trailer to receive more CDs. I sat hostage at his breakfast bar and slowly suffocated from the smell of laundry detergent as he told me story after story about his experiences being anti-racist and pro-Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in the army back in the 1990s. The overpowering stench assaulted my nose and clogged my lungs. Outside the wind was picking up. I could hear thunder over the Santa Catalina Mountains. Finally after a particularly loud boom, I hopped up and said desperately, “Do you want to ride bikes before it starts raining?”

Mid-story, he stared at me in surprise. I apologized and whined something about being allergic to the smell of laundry detergent.

“That’s Lysol,” he said. I can differentiate the smell of laundry detergent from Lysol. It hardly mattered. Either way, I was busting a gut trying not to cough all over his kitchen. I grabbed my stack of CDs and went outside to find clean air and a fantastic sunset.

We rode bikes once around the park as the wind picked up. My hat stayed on my head. Bill’s went flying. Pedaling into the wind was a challenge. I coughed and laughed and pedaled and admired the sky as the rain began pelting down. Rain doesn’t fall here, it pelts, like the sky is actively trying to nail you with giant orbs of cold water. The storms here never fail to impress.

Back at Bill’s trailer, I loaded his wife’s bike into the back of my car while he put his in the shed. We stood not too close to each other and watched lightning bolts shoot from the tops of the clouds to the ground, seemed like just over the next ridge.

I knew what was coming. I can still read the signals. Even after all these years being single, I know when a guy is making his move. Bill was just unsure enough to give me a warning sign: He started to spread his arms out toward me. And he asked permission.

“Can I give you a hug?”

My body answered for me. Before my brain could engage, I had backed off and put my hands up in front of my chest in a defensive posture. I shook my head babbling, “No, I don’t think so, no, sorry, not for me, no, sorry.”

He is a tall man but he’s thin as a stick. I am sure I could deck him, especially when adrenaline and anger take over my brain. He would be a puddle on the ground before I had a chance to apologize for my unladylike behavior. However, politeness is an insidious disease. When taken to an extreme, politeness—the overwhelming desire to avoid giving offense—can cause me to exit my body and hand over control of it to someone else. I simply float away. This must be avoided. I’ve spent too much time in my life hovering near the ceiling while icky things happen. 

No hugs.

On someone else's memory lane

My new friend Bill at the trailer park called me on the phone. “I have something to show you. Come over sometime. But call first, okay, unless you want to scrub my back in the shower.”

Bill is eighty-two years old. I’ve learned when socializing with old folks, it’s best not to lollygag. They could die before you get around to showing up. Case in point, Bill’s wife Linda died in her sleep. Imagine waking up next to that. Anyway, if you promise to do something for an old person, and you are serious about it, do not delay.

On the day Bill called, I was at the housesit trailer cleaning up the place in anticipation of the return of the homeowner. I wanted to leave the place spic and span, whatever that means, you know, pack it in, pack it out, leave no trace. I don’t want them to realize I slept on my foam rubber mattress on the floor for four months because my back does not appreciate memory foam. I was quite comfortable, thanks for asking. I regret nothing. I consider my four months living out of boxes and bags and sleeping semi-rough to be good preparation for living in my car, should that moment ever come.

After the sun went down, I hauled the bike out of the back of my car and rode over to the clubhouse to mail some letters back to their senders. I’ll tell you the story of those letters some other time, if I remember. Here, I’ll just say that I finally got around to checking the mailbox at my new apartment. That box holds a lot of mail.

From the clubhouse, I called Walt and told him I was around if he wanted me to come over. “I can be there in two minutes.”

Two minutes later, I wobbled around the curve and found him waiting for me on his back porch, delighted to see me. “You look like you are riding more smoothly,” he said.

“Less wobbly,” I agreed. I propped the bike on its kickstand and followed him into the kitchen.

“I have something for you,” he said. He handed me a 5 x 7 color photo of me sitting on his wife’s bike in his driveway. Behind me is a tall block wall and beyond that are the tops of cactuses and trees. Starbucks is just out of view. I am wearing black pants, a white jacket, and my straw hat—my bike-riding uniform. I am smiling self-consciously at the camera. I always prefer to be the one taking the picture.

“Thanks, Bill,” I said with appropriate appreciation and enthusiasm. I assumed he had a photo printer stashed away in the bowels of his trailer, excuse me, mobile home. In one of our conversations, I referred to the homes in the park as trailers. “Trailers have hitches,” Bill had said. “These are mobile homes.”

Bill invited me into the living room. It looked the same as I remembered—altar for Linda’s ashes, comfy seating, baseball game on the big screen television. “Remember those shows I was telling you about? I have them on DVD.” Bill pulled an enormous black zippered disk holder from a cabinet. There must have been three hundred CDs in the thing. He flipped through the sections. “The truth about the war,” he said, meaning Viet Nam. “The truth about Watergate. The truth about the environment.” Most of the DVDs were labeled with the word “Frontline.”

Finally he found the disks he sought. I sat on the marshmallowy loveseat while he queued up a DVD. He stood in front of the big screen, a tall bony man with skinny legs, a slight pot belly, square shoulders, and no neck, pointing the remote at the DVD player, fast-forwarding until he got to the right part. “Here we go,” he said, grinning like an adolescent through his crooked overbite.

The video quality was poor. Someone had set a stationary camera on a table near the open area that served as a stage. In the background, people could be seen moving through a hallway to and from the restrooms. The audio was scratchy, and the images were pixelated, but I got the gist. It was a home movie, amateur documentation of a holiday event of the kind you hope you never have to see again. Bad enough you had to live through it once. Not for Bill. Bill clearly loved reliving his time in the limelight.

It was a holiday-themed party at the clubhouse at the trailer park. MoHo park, excuse me. The year was 2010. A huskier, more limber Bill came onto the stage, recognizable by his overbite and square no-neck shoulders. He was dressed in garish printed pajama pants and a snowman shirt. On his head was a wig made of long stringy black hair. He was joined by three other oddly dressed people. Two women wore tie-dyed t-shirts and the otherman man in the group wore a red plaid sport jacket that looked like it was made from a quilt. This guy introduced the group as the Grandpas and Grandmas. They proceed to lipsync to songs from the 50s and 60s, including Monday Monday, an homage to the Mamas and the Papas. Present-day Bill giggled as he watched his younger self performing. I did my best to be appreciative, although I kept an eye on the clock. It was growing dark outside and I still had to ride the bike back to my car.

“Wait, I have one more to show you,” Bill said, switching out the DVD for another. “This one is a little longer.” I settled back on the loveseat, telling myself if there is a heaven, I’ll have something nice waiting for me there, like maybe some ten percent off coupons to IKEA.

The second event was another holiday party, in the same clubhouse room, three years later. In 2013, Bill looked about the same, wearing the same ridiculous snowman shirt. His associates this year were two women (neither of which was Bill’s wife) and and a younger man. Of course, this is a fifty-five and older mobile home park, so nobody was all that young. I can hardly believe I qualify to live in this place, but whatever.

I was interested to see Bill’s wife on the video. Linda was a short, small-boned woman with narrow hips and heavy breasts. Her gray bubble of hair did not move as she clapped and bounced to the music. She stood offstage by a piano and smiled the whole time. She looked like she had a nice personality. I noticed two things. She had no sense of rhythm, and Bill largely ignored her throughout the forty-minute show.

Bill and his group performed a pantomime to bits of songs from the decades from the 1940s to the 1980s. The audience was in good spirits and clapped and sang along, despite the fact that dinner had been delayed because no one had turned on the pilot light to heat up the lasagna.

The video operator was more creative this year, panning around the large crowded room. At least sixty people sat at long tables in the large meeting room, sipping beverages with a minimum of heckling. It’s a large space, with a piano and fireplace and shelves full of books. I’ve seen that room through the windows but never been inside. They’ve been remodeling during my sojurn at the moho park. I peered inside a couple times as I came by every few evenings to borrow and return paperback books at the book exchange boxes placed on the walkway outside the clubhouse door. During Covid and remodeling, the clubhouse was closed. Now the books are back inside on the shelves, and the outdoor book exchange is gone.

Bill was thrilled to have me as a captive audience to witness him relive his memories. He watched the show with obvious glee. “Here comes the good part,” he said several times, or “Let’s see if you recognize this song,” or “Did you see what I did there?” I did my best to be a good audience member, laughing in the right places, clapping once in a while, nodding, asking some relevant questions to show I was paying attention. I tried not to watch the clock, which was directly above the television screen.

I’ve met people like Bill, people who are desperate to be the center of attention, even if their moment of fame comes in a skit at a mobile home trailer park holiday party. He relished being the star. I got the impression he watched this DVD often. He knew all the lines. He echoed his words as he sat on the couch, chuckling, reliving his moments in the limelight, giving me the play-by-play of the show, explaining what was happening, like for example when the two women suddenly crouched down behind a barricade and started putting on vests and neckerchieves.

In fact, the group had props for all their songs. A lot of effort went into creating this production. The group dressed in cowboy hats and western gear to sing “Long Tall Texan.” The younger man “rode” a horsehead attached to a stick. During another number, they tossed armfuls of stuffed skunks into the audience as they sang “Dead Skunk in the Middle of the Road.”

“I was singing,” Bill told me. “I wasn’t pantomiming, I was singing. I only listened to the song three or four times to learn it.”

During the closing number, a lively Beach Boys tune, some of the audience members near the stage joined the group to dance to the music, Linda among them. She bounced on stiff knees, clapping off-beat, smiling gamely, while her husband Bill ignored her. Other than introducing her once at the start of the show, he never interacted with her, did not look at her, did not dance with her or touch her, did not stand near her when she joined the group on the stage. She might as well have been one of the props.

After the show was over, Bill motioned me to follow him toward the back of the mobile home. I followed him in sock feet along the plushly carpeted hallway as he showed me the photo gallery of Linda with the grandkids, one every Christmas until the last Christmas, when it was just the grandkids alone. Bill led me into the master bedroom, occupied by a king-sized bed and a couple dressers. I thought, if this goes sideways, I can probably take him. He’s built out of sticks. The overhead light was harsh. He pulled out some things from a dresser drawer.

“You might like to have these,” he said, holding out a navy and white machine-knitted winter scarf with tassles on both ends. “And these,” he said, holding out a plastic pack of footie socks. “And these gloves,” he said, handing me a pair of worn black wool gloves. I accepted the gifts politely, thinking oh lord, not more stuff. I put the scarf around my neck. It smelled of perfume.

Next, Bill led me into a large dressing room area. He pointed at a row of bottles and jars arrayed along a counter in front of a wall of mirrors. “Can you use any of that stuff?” I declined, claiming allergies, which is true. I do not wear cosmetics and use lotions at my peril.

Bill led me to a closet. “These?” he said, pointing to several knitted pullovers that I knew were much too small for me, even if I wore that style of clothing. I shook my head. “How about these shoes?” Bill said, pointing to a shoe caddy holding black slip-ons with low heels. I shook my head regretfully. Back in the hallway, Bill opened a cupboard. The shelves were packed with hardback books, most of which were by the psychic Sylvia Browne. Linda had been enamored with the psychic’s writing and performances. Bill offered to loan me some. I declined.

By now it was 9 pm and solid dark. I felt like I’d just missed meeting Linda, like she was just in the next room, just out of sight. I knew her clothes, I knew her smell. I did not have to ask Bill how much he missed her, even as he was jettisoning the last of her possessions. I did the same with my mother’s things before I left Portland. You can’t keep everything, and it’s better if someone else can use the stuff.

We went outside. Bill got his bike out of his shed and rode with me through the warm night air back to my car. Along the way, under a street light, I saw yet another flat lizard, pulverized into the asphalt by a car tire because it paused when it should have hustled.

Flying through the night

Bill rides a bike around the trailer park in the evening and we occasionally cross paths as I'm out walking my route. A few nights ago, we stopped and had a lengthy conversation about the weather, whether it would rain, what monsoon means, and the phenomenon known as virga. 

The next evening we crossed paths again. Bill told me his wife had died last year and asked me if I would like to have her bicycle. I said yes. He told me the number of his mobile home, and two nights ago, I set out walking in that direction, despite ominous clouds and light sprinkles. I'm an Oregonian—I'm not afraid of rain, even the downpours we have here in Tucson. I marched up the middle of the asphalt road, intent on my destination. I almost didn't see the woman standing on the edge of her gravel lawn waving at me in the deepening twilight.

"You might not want to go that way."

I stopped. She was brown-haired, perhaps somewhat younger than me, who can tell, everyone in Tucson looks ageless to me. She wore a big t-shirt and loose pants. 

"Why, what's going on?" I asked.

"There's two javelinas up there walking around."

I wanted to say javelinas, I'm not afraid of two javelinas, but I didn't want to offend. At that point, the sprinkles intensified. Not quite drops yet. We both looked at the clouds and continued our conversation. 

"I've seen one javelina around," I said. "She seems pretty shy."

"They usually run in packs," she said. "They can be nasty, especially if there are babies around. Oh boy, looks like it might start pouring!"

"That's okay. I'm staying just over there, on the other side of the wash."

"Do you want a ride back home?"

I was thinking, who is this troll blocking my way? My destination was close but the rain was coming down harder. I had the feeling I just needed to back off. I was more leery of her than I was of two javelinas. To keep walking forward toward danger after her obvious warning seemed rude, so I turned around and retraced my steps. I walked around the park in circles, waiting for the rain, which didn't arrive until much later in the night, disrupting my sleep by pounding on the metal awnings. 

Last night, the sky was clear. I tried again. The troll was nowhere in sight as I marched up the street past her place. As I came around the corner, there was Bill on his bike coming toward me. I waved. 

Bill is a thin rangy sunbaked man with bad teeth, glasses, and shaky hands. Every time I've seen him, he's wearing a beige polo shirt, tan cargo shorts, knee-high socks, and well-worn white sneakers. 

"Come inside, I have something to give you," he said. "Besides the bike."

"Oh, I don't know, with Covid, is that such a good idea, to let a stranger into your home?" I said, standing on his back steps 

"Just for a minute."

He obviously didn't care about Covid. I didn't have my mask with me. I've had my shots. I assume he got his too. The likelihood of us transmitting Covid to each other was probably small. I followed him through his kitchen door, admiring his shiny beige compression socks as he went up the steps. 

"It's all original," he said, pointing proudly to the counters and cupboards. "The floor too." I nodded in appreciation, noting the1970s beige linoleum squares and pale green and white swirl Formica countertops. "My daughter-in-law painted that part," Bill said, pointing to a strip of blood red wall running around the room above the white cupboards. I admired the breakfast bar with its pale swirly Formica surface. "Psychedelic," he grinned.

He led me into the dining room, which was carpeted in plush beige shag. I took off my shoes and left them on the kitchen floor. He told me the story of his dark brown oak dining room table (oak grown in the U.S., shipped to the Netherlands to be made into a dining set, and then shipped back to the U.S.).  Next, we toured the living room. Three big overstuffed pieces of furniture occupied half the space, arranged around a coffee table. The base of the table was wrought iron, and the top was made from squares of desert-colored cut rock. "It took two guys to get that thing in here," Bill said proudly. 

A large dark wood entertainment center dominated the wall opposite the longest sofa. Bill pulled out doors and opened cupboards to display his collection of DVDs and CDs. He asked me what kind of music I like. I mentioned 1980s new wave dance music. I wonder if he's heard of New Order or David Bowie. 

"You'll like this, then," he said, handing me a stack of CDs with hand-written labels. He'd compiled his favorite songs onto CDs. I lifted my glasses so I could read the songs. "Air Supply," I murmured. "Okay." 

"You take those and listen to them." 

I dutifully accepted a small stack of CDs and held them carefully as he led me over to a table against the wall. The table was covered end to end with sympathy cards. In the center of the table was a wooden box with an engraved tree on the front. I read the inscription about losing a limb from the family tree. Bill started to read it and choked up. I finished reading it for him. 

"Everyone here loved her so much," he said. "She was the nicest person you could ever hope to meet."

I did my best to be a good listener. When it was time to go, Bill put the CDs in a plastic bag along with an extra inner tube for the bike tires. I slipped my shoes back on and followed him out to the carport. He got a little bike out of a shed and wheeled it to me. It was a sturdy girl's bike with tall handle bars, no gears, and old-fashioned foot brakes, a lot like the bikes I rode as a child. I got onboard. 

"You have changed my life today, Bill," I said, thinking about the rides I could take on the bike path and around the mobile home park. He grinned. 

"I hope I remember how to do this," I said. I hung the plastic bag on the handlebar and off I went into the darkness. 

I rode back to the trailer, reveling in the warm darkness. When I pulled up next to my car, I heard a voice.

"I just wanted to make sure you got home okay."

I knew right away who it was. I turned and saw Bill on his bike. 

When javelinas fly

I came face-to-face with a rotund javelina a few nights ago. I think it might be one lonely female who wanders the trailer park nibbling on weeds. She moves slowly. I don't think I could call it a saunter, after getting a better look at her. I think she's moping. She is always alone, and javelina normally travel in packs. I think she's lost her family.

Her preferred weeds might soon be gone too. A man in boots carrying a two-gallon jug of some liquid I suspect I would not want to get on my hands came around a couple days ago. I am guessing it was a man. All I saw were hairy legs and large shoes. 

I was sitting at the kitchen table in front of my laptop reading the online news in order to avoid preparing for my Zoom class when I heard a strange rhythmic groaning sound outside. Through the window blinds, I saw a pair of hairy legs and booted feet walking on the rocks between the trailers. Every few moments, the boots would stop. One human hand holding a spray wand would appear and shoot a clear liquid onto patches of green weeds that had enthusiastically emerged after the first rains. Every now and then, the other hand would appear and push a plunger into the jug to prime the pump on the sprayer. That priming motion was the source of the noise. After jamming the plunger a few times, the spray wand was ready to attack more little green weeds. I never saw the man's face; however, I noticed he was not wearing gloves. Or long pants. And it was mid-day, easily 105°F. Wouldn't want that guy's job.

A few days later, the green weeds are looking peaked, but that could be because we haven't had rain for a week or so. Or it could be because they were murdered with herbicide. 

Speaking of murder, on Thursday, after two long months of wanting to strangle the leasing staff at the apartment that supposedly had approved me to rent, I finally signed the lease. A link to the lease agreement had arrived in my email inbox on Tuesday. The lease agreement email came from a no-reply email address, not a strong signifier of good faith. Luckily, another email arrived from an email address I could reply to, telling me about an option to get renters' insurance. I quickly saved that email address into my contacts list.

I went through the lease's many pages and addenda, jotting a list of my questions. The main problems I saw had to do with the lack of specificity about the unit I would be renting and how the electricity charges would be calculated. Signing a lease without knowing which unit I was renting seemed wildly risky, similar to packing everything you own in a minivan and driving 1,500 miles to an unfamiliar city. I certainly didn't want to rent one of the units that fronted on the busy street. I practiced deep breathing. I was ready to accept the possibility that these two months of waiting might have been for naught. 

I called the leasing office and left a message. No response. I sent a message to the legitimate email address with my list of questions. No response.

Nevertheless, I persisted. I visited the property management company website to find contact information and sent a polite email. Their website touted their fantastic customer-centric service, and proclaimed their desire to build relationships with tenants and property owners (probably more with property owners than with tenants, but I admired their inclusivity). Welcome home, they said. You belong here! Right. They manage many properties throughout Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico. I'm a marketing professional (sort of, sometimes). I know how it works. 

Because they recently took over managing this apartment complex, I had hopes. Almost immediately, I received a response. Miracle! We will forward your email to the leasing staff. Oh, and what are your questions, maybe we can help. Even though the email was not signed, I was heartened to receive a response from what I'm mostly certain was a live human.

I tidied up my list of laments, sent it off, and waited. No response. I wondered, are my expectations out of line? Marketing is all about communication. I know how it should work. I can recognize when it doesn't.

It occurred me to call the leasing agent again to leave yet another message. Maybe the property management company had succeeded in lighting a fire. Miracle! She answered the phone! The first time in two months, a real person answered the phone! I know it sounds silly, but I'd forgotten how low my expectations had fallen. I was so excited, I could barely speak. I stumbled through my questions, and she gave me acceptable answers! I asked if I could come and see the unit before I signed the lease. Twenty minutes later I had parked my beast outside the leasing office and met the leasing agent for the first time. I felt like I was in the presence of a unicorn. I wore my face mask (she did not), and I treaded softly, not wanting to scare her back into the jungle. After some tries, she found the proper key and opened the door into what I think will be my digs for the next year.

Even though I'm basically moving into a motel with a kitchenette, I signed the lease. The next day, I drove over there to get the keys. I was told I needed to procure a money order first. Would have been nice to know that first, but oh well. Off I went to get a money order, and returned, money order in hand. The hoop appears. I jump through. 

Upon receiving the keys, I inspected the apartment (can you really call it an apartment, maybe postage stamp would be a better descriptor). I took lots of photos and made a list of issues. Compared to the Love Shack, this new place is clean and dry and free of mold. It's got a tub. It's got a full-size refrigerator and a Barbie-size four-burner stove that might accommodate one loaf of bread, not that I plan to do any baking. It has a walk-partway-in closet. The floors throughout are gray woodgrain vinyl planks—not hardwood, but I've seen worse. At least, the kitchen floor isn't a black and white checkerboard of poorly adhered, chipping, paint-stained linoleum tiles. The walls are off white textured, no holes allowed. Perfect Zoom background. It's going to be fine. 

I just returned from my evening walk around the trailer park. I met the usual residents. For some reason, their tiny dogs decided not to bark at me. I discovered why, I think, thirty seconds later. As I came around the corner, the man in their dog-walking party appeared and said, "There's a javelina crossing the street down there. William in 65 feeds it."

Well, how about that. I'm sure now one sad lonely overweight female javelina wanders the park. We make our rounds at about the same time, just as the sun is setting. I'm walking to keep my blood pressure down, and she's walking to get handouts, which no doubt keep her from getting depressed. As I went along the street, I kept my eyes peeled, and there she was. I was a good hundred feet away. We had a standoff for a minute. She wanted to get past me, and I wanted to get past her. I went across to the other side of the road and walked very slowly toward her, trying to video the interaction with my phone. There was no interaction, really. She skulked along from driveway to driveway, trying to get past. She could smell me but not see me all that well. She tried to hide behind a bush that didn't have enough room to hide her. She seemed shy, morose, and not inclined to linger or nibble, so I went on my way.

Is anything really new?

Howdy Blogbots. How are you doing? Have you ever wondered how time can seem as slow as summer and yet also be as fast as a flash flood? Time is clearly malleable (but not by me). I know I get the same twenty-four hours every day, not more some days and less other days. I know it's my perception that shifts. It's like my assumption that I stand at the center of the universe and everything revolves around me. It's erroneous, I know, but darn hard to shake.

So, time. I'm waiting to move into an apartment. It's been a long two months, waiting. Somehow, though, I still wake up every day and say out loud, what the heck, how can it be another morning? Seems like we just had one yesterday. What gives?

Part of me thinks, this better be one hell of a great apartment, considering how difficult it has been to wrangle it into being. I'm past the point of frustration and headed into the great hilarity beyond. Can this be happening? This can't possibly be happening. Yet, it seems to be happening. What a joke. Har har. 

Speaking of getting bored with the same old, one word for you:  sunsets. At first I was entranced with the Tucson sunsets. I photographed them endlessly and sent sunset-of-the-day photos to my siblings and friends, who responded with polite appreciation. After a while, I realized I might as well have sent them the same image every day, because every sunset looked just as amazing as the last. I hate to admit it, but seen one, seen all. 

Same with flash floods and the rushing Rillito River. I could hardly believe my eyes the first time I saw that tree-lined dry riverbed flowing bank-to-bank with muddy brown water. I filled up my phone with a gallery of photos and sent some to my siblings and friends, who were equally amazed that a rushing river could suddenly appear out of nowhere in a dry desert town. 

Not so dry. The wettest July on record, I guess, given that we've had thunderstorms and torrential downpours almost every day for the past month. At first I was leery of opening the front door. The wind howled and lashed the trees. The rain pounded on the metal awnings. The energy was overwhelming. The second time, I ventured down the steps. The third time I took my phone out into it and tried to capture the lightning without getting killed. Now I wake up at 3:00 a.m. and groggily think, oh hey, is that another thunderstorm as the thunder crashes overhead and the rain hammers the roof. Ho hum. I bet the Rillito is full. Cool. Maybe I'll check it out later. Or not.

My first sighting of a javelina got my heartrate going. It was dark when I saw a mysterious shadow crunching in the gravel next to the neighbor's little red Toyota. I was properly astounded when I recognized the porcine silhouette. My second sighting occurred a couple evenings ago as the sun was setting in yet another glorious display. I was about ten minutes into my hike around the trailer park when a fat brown peccary sauntered across the road barely ten yards in front of me. I froze, wondering if I could outrun the creature if it happened to point its tusks at me. My hesitation delayed my second thought, which was, phone, get my phone! It took me long precious seconds to dig my phone out of my pocket so I ended up photographing the javelina's porky brown hind end as it moseyed between trailers toward the dry wash out back. 

I enlarged the photo and put a red circle around the hind end so you could maybe just discern the dark hind end of the javelina from the dark shrubbery around it. I sent the photo to my family. My sister responded with gratifying amazement and a little bit of concern for my safety, which is always nice to hear. Then she asked me when am I moving, again? thus reminding me that I perhaps have better things to do than photoshopping red circles around the butt of a javelina. 

I've (metaphorically) jumped off a cliff into a new city and here I am, frozen in midair, not know if or when or how I'm going to stick the landing. I'm repeatedly bombarded by novelty. After a while, I have to wonder, is there anything new under the sun? Now I find my amazement in realizing I'm on my way to becoming jaded by fantastical Tucson. Wake up! New day, new sunset, new critters to admire. The sun is going down. No thunderstorms on tap to boil up and rush down the mountains at me. Time to go see what's outside.