Trade Offs

You can't be a fussbudget in an apartment, it isn't a private residence and in an apartment building the clientele are mostly transient with a few who are stone still until someone hands them their walker.  Each family has it's quirks, and very often you feel as though you are right in the living room with them.  This evening, I hear two new voices in the rooms below, in a beginning argument.  A young man and woman, with her anxiety rising to a higher pitch while his voice is getting louder but more curt, each word snapped off like a military march.  The smell of something sweet is baking, so shortly I expect they will carbo-load themselves into a stubborn lethargy, still angry but sluggish from the serotonin with fewer volleys shot across the room.

This is far, far better than who lived there before, an unknown entity who I only heard through the pipes in the bathroom when he would call on the phone.  Jovial, no yelling, no smashing sounds, but he smoked cigarettes, I am guessing purchased at the Res, that were stuffed with toenail clippings from the nursing home and squirrel mange.   It was the second worst smell ever, the first being something I am not at liberty to easily say but could be persuaded.  My neighbor was relegated to smoking in the second bedroom unless the wife was out and then he roamed everywhere.  I stuffed the openings around the heating pipes to little effect, and though he wasn't a heavy smoker, the two or three a day most likely killed any mice in the walls.

Now I have the Arguing Bakers, which so far is fine, they are apparently settled and watching television while sedating themselves with slice and bake cookies.  Maybe not such a serious flaw, for this is the first I've heard dissonance.  On the other side of me is a couple that are nice people but the man spends roughly thirty minutes of his evening hacking and gurgling for air.  Again, smokers, but it doesn't waft this way.  Their dog is ugly, and has the look of someone who was just hit in the head with a mallet.  He doesn't bark much, if at all.  Not the sharpest knife in the kitchen, drawn by Tex Avery.

Above are also Mystery People, I believe there is a child whom I rarely hear, unless he has an itch that can only be cured by tap dancing on the linoleum.  Not even once a month, and not at ungodly hours.
I am lucky to have mostly invisible neighbors who are friendly but mind their own business as I do mine.  Previously previously below me lived the drug addled son of some Hottentot bigwig on the board, and so was able to slam doors and yell, YELL anytime he was displeased.  Three a.m. arguments with his put-upon girlfriend who would cry and say she was leaving but never did.  G'WAN, GET OUT OF HERE SINCE YOU DON'T LIKE IT YOU @#$*^$.  Once they had people over, and the young brat was showing off his guitar mad skills by playing the theme to The Dukes of Hazzard halfway through, messing up, scream swearing, and starting again.  I imagined everyone else was pinned to the furniture and trying not to move so as not to set off the crazy that was already leaking all over the floor.  The skills and the guitar hit the wall, and so the next entertainment was a loop of Allman Brother's Jessica ninety nine gabillion times in a row as loud as the speakers he most likely found in a dumpster behind RadioShack back in the seventies could pump out.  Wall of Sound, Voice of the Theater.  I EFFING LOVE THIS, MAN.  YEAH, I GOT THEM FOR NOTHIN'.

Well too bad, because a fight broke out when one of the guests suggested they change the cd to Boston or some such tripe and this was an insult to the host, his hospitality, the Allman Brother's, the bottles of booze, the Noonited States of Hamerica, and the neighbors who wanted to hear Jessica some more as it was only two a.m. and no one had to get up for work but if they did, they'd be smiling because that fine Southern fretwork would still be playing in their heads until they drove their car in front of a semi.

GET OUT OF MY EFFING APARTMENT.  GET OUT.  Thunk.  Struggling noises. "Let me get my cigarettes, man."  EFF YOUR EFFING CIGARETTES GET OUT OF MY EFFING HOUSE YOU EFFING EFFER MOTHEREFFER.  It was the second time I called 911 on this moron, they asked if there was a gun, but how the hell would I know that, my Superman x-ray vision couldn't see through the linoleum so most likely there wasn't a gun, but could you send someone over to break up the fight?  Slam, slamslamslam gutpunch.  People around the wrasslin' men were trying to pull the nutjob off of the poor sap who probably gave up smoking that very minute, and placate him with "It ain't worth it, man, let him go," while shoving the hapless guest out the door and into the hall where he wondered what the hell just happened.

The resident would be reprimanded, have a finger shook at him, and then quiet down for three serene months until the girlfriend really did leave, thank god for her safety, and he imploded, smashed up the apartment, slashed her clothing, and was put on a psychotropic milkshake of at least twelve syllables that made him as complacent as a Hostess cupcake.  He functioned, had not really been able to work anyways, and this allowed people to say hello without having a grip on the pepper spray in their pocket.  Life was quieter until ten year old Ricky moved in with his lopsided wigged Mom and promptly keyed all the car doors in the lot.  It took over a year to get them evicted, as management at the time was a group of glassy-eyed bikers who were running drug deals off of the office computers and wore t-shirts that said "Gas, grass, or ass" under their leathers when you went in to pay the rent.

Whoa.  The brownies must have worn off, just heard the eff word.  I'm going to bed, I don't imagine these birds will get that loud and if they are non-smokers, they can spout out profanities till the cows come home.  Trade off.  Swear words don't give you cancer or make your place smell like an ashtray.  If they drag out Neal Diamond singing Cracklin' Rosie, however, you may see that greenish curtain hanging over the lake, hissing with Coburnian indignation and a few f-bombs.

Sleep well, dream of the coming spring rains.  Good night.