I'm a damn good neighbor. My only criteria of that is not calling the cops when my drug dipped neighbors have psycho girls punching, biting and burning people and then yelling underneath my bedroom window "JUST TELL ME WHAT I DID WRONG!"
My neighbors moved in a few months ago. I rather like them enough. They're mere kids. A couple of guys and they have a lot of 'traffic' going through. There's even a 'look out' guy who I like to address as Shady.
But the guys and they're friends/customers/frontmen are all nice to me and the Humanling. So I really don't care what they are doing behind their wooden door, so long as it doesn't involve my fire alarm needing to go off.
The first paragraph up there is actually a rerun of 24 hours ago.
As I held two juicy tomatoes today (I hate tomatoes but I buy them at the farmers market every weekend for the 85 year old woman downstairs. Actually, I buy her one. My sink overflowed into her apartment this week though, so this time I got her two.) Humanling called to me that the neighbor (not Ned) wanted to speak with me. The tomatoes and I complied.
He wore a Brooklyn sweatjacket and stood before me looking serious. He wanted to apologize for the noise last night. He explained that it was his girlfriend that was heard in the metro area, screaming last night. Apparently there is a drug issue (did I mention that before?) only she wasn't having the usual cocktail and blatantly was touchy feeling with some other guy in this dude's apartment. He walked in on it and she didn't attempt to stop what she was doing. So he asked her to leave. That one request caused at least three people to get punched in the face, bit and burned with cigarettes.
I now applaud my decision last night, mid irritation, not to open the window or go downstairs and confront. I pulled a Ghandi, I stayed peaceful, and it eventually subsided.
Brooklyn showed me his arm. A two inch burn slide. He seemed pretty legit about it.
Within four more minutes, I knew that a move to another state had gotten messed up because of his father who he hadn't seen since he was five. That the girlfriend was supposed to move down but didn't and he came back to be with her.
I was informed about the other roommate who is slipping off methadone back into the real deal. And how Brooklyn basically goes for a walk alone sometimes or stays in his room to avoid all the traffic. Originally I thought they were one big happy Plant farming family over there.
Whenever Humanling and I walk up the mutual hallway and the telltale smell and fog tap our senses, I unlock the door muttering, "I see Cypress Hill is home."
I have no issues with their stuff behind their doors. And I applaud the boy for coming to apologize to me. And .... I felt the impulse to fix it. But what could I do - hand him a Gregg Braden book and a candle?
Within an hour, I ran into another acquaintence outside. This one probably in his early 50s. The answer to "How've you been?" was a mini-series. He's hooked up with a crack addict who's ex fought him in January. Then he had some medical thing and lost his job in May. Only to get hit in the crosswalk by a truck. Another impulse to lift to the light and make it better.
If I weren't married to His Royal Turdness for a year and a half, I wouldn't understand it. And because of that marriage, I want peace for these guys more than they'd ever know.
Joe Jonas is performing a duet with Miss Piggy as I write this. I don't have Humanling as a hall pass since she's in bed sleeping. I know way too much about these guys so maybe its time to disengage from all things electronic until the morning.
