The Transporter Couch

I got fired yesterday. Or maybe I quit. It’s a little ambiguous but since it’s ME talking and it’s MY forum I’m gonna take a ME stance and say I quit.

I won’t bother going into the details, but on the surface, they suspected me (but did not accuse me) of stealing from them. They vaguely offered me a “punishment stage” and I said no, thank you. And walked away.

Peter was looking like he was about to cry throughout the meeting. Judy just looked angry and disappointed.

Well I’m angry and disappointed too. I hope they both wept at the loss this supplies them. And while something DID happen, I said it was an accident and they didn’t trust me. And that’s what I said to them, “If you don’t trust me in this moment, you never will. And you don’t. And you won’t.” And that was my parting shot.

LOOK AT ME, I thought, in my anger. I’m wearing $900 worth of clothes. Why would you think I would steal $70 worth of liquor from you? What is it about my demeanor that would let you question my integrity; I do $10,000 deposits for you; I come in on time and at your behest; I ….. I ….. I just can’t believe they would believe I would steal.

But, the tie is broken. They don’t trust me. I’m very sad.

My living room windows face north and east so it’s very very very bright in here in the mornings. This morning dawned gray but eventually the sun came out and suddenly I couldn’t see my laptop screen and I said “WHERE is my cap??” My eyes are sensitive and I wear a cap or a visor when it’s really sunny. Anything to add contrast and shade. And my visor was *over there* meaning hanging off a chair that wasn’t handy. And for ten long seconds I stared at it and willed it to just come to me, like I could employ The Force to make it happen. And it didn’t happen. I had to get up and WALK over there. God that sucks!

The other day I made a reference to a room at a bar, and I called it “the front living room.” I have lately been informed that the establishment itself calls it “the parlour.”

When I was a kid I lived in a rather large house and one room was “the living room” and it was pretty much off limits to children. It had these big monster fancy pocket doors that were used not really to keep anyone in or out but for ventilation purposes. The furniture was nice. It was always clean. It was where my parents entertained company. There was, incidentally, also a dining room, with its own scary big doors, with nice furniture, and we (children) only ate in there five times a year. The sort of center of the house was “the den” which served as the living room and dining room and gathering place for the whole family, every day.

One day …. it’s a complicated situation so I won’t spell it all out …. Carolyn Stiles came over to bring a gift. Only my sister Anne and I were home and we ushered her into the living room. The room was painted greenish silverish blue, “french blue” I think it was called, and the trim was white. The hardwood floor had a very handsome rug. And Carolyn said, “what a lovely parlour.”

Anne and I just sort of did a double-take. Like….. WHAT? It was like Barbara Stanwyck in The Big Valley. (Nick! Heath! Jarrod! Come into the parlour!) I was more or less a grown man at that point, perhaps 18 or 19 years old, and I KNEW the word existed but I’d always associated it with a funeral home. (These thoughts gel as they do because of the long week I’ve had and it isn’t over yet.)

This morning I lay in bed, as usual my body at rest and my mind in motion, and I remembered Herman Munster, tragic character that he was. And he worked at a funeral parlour, evidently. And he would come home and give Lily a kiss and she would casually ask, “how were things down at the parlour today?” And he would say, “fine.” And only this morning, as I lay there, did it occur to me what macabre humor that was. Then I thought about the irony of going from the funeral parlour to the Lincoln Street “parlour.”

Many years later, after my parents moved, the house sat empty for a couple of months and I had occasion to stay there for a little white. There was a table and two chairs downstairs, and a bed upstairs. They did that for tax purposes or something but in any case it was convenient. Oh, and there were towels in the bathroom. One day I was rollerblading downstairs. You could start in the kitchen and just zoom around the empty house and go in big circles. And I was doing just that when I zoomed into the front hall and found the realtor and three prospects standing there. And Bob said, “should you be doing that?” And I was at once abashed and belligerent, and I went with the latter: “It’s still my house, Bob. As soon as you sell it I’ll stop.” Then I bladed away. And hid.

I told my parents I was blogging and they….. well mom’s 66 and dad’s 72 and they read Newsweek so they know that blogs exist but I don’t think they read them. And mom said to me, “I wouldn’t go near it.”

I wonder why. Maybe they’re afraid they’re going to learn something about me that they didn’t learn in the previous 40 years. Maybe they’re intimidated by my capacity to use coarse language. Maybe Maybe Maybe. But when she said that, I didn’t know whether to be sad or glad. Maybe… a little of both.

Why do pets throw up on the rug? Dogs, cats, whatever, they start making that weird … mechanical sort of noise and you’re not paying attention because you’re engrossed in an Umberto Eco essay and suddenly it just COMES to you that they’re about to puke. And inevitably they’re standing on the *#&$*(& carpet. And there’s hardwood one foot away. And you drop your book and race but it’s too late. Why the RUG? Is it because they think it’s indoor grass? Is it because they want you to suffer their pain? Why? Why? I’ve had cats and I’ve had dogs and I’ve known them all to throw up lunch and they ALWAYS head for the carpet.

Just so you know I’m not a complete and total pig, I DID at least clean up the cat vomit!

My house is a complete war zone. There’s laundry everywhere, some clean, some dirty, none where it belongs. There are five pairs of shoes on the living room floor and like nine pairs in the bedroom. The kitchen’s dirty, the bathroom’s dirty, the porch is messy and the cat threw up on the rug. Sweet.

But the coffee table…. Let me just see if I can describe what a wreck it is. Moving from left to right I see:

a box of CDs, a camera, a cordless phone, a piece of folded up paper, a wristwatch, a necklace, a pair of (really nice!) amber cufflinks, another watch, loose CDs, the cat’s collar, some business cards, a lottery ticket that didn’t win but that I wrote a phone number on, ANOTHER watch, a wax stick and a seal with a W on it, some more pieces of paper, an envelope I wrote the name on but couldn’t find my address book so couldn’t complete the address, a CD R-W burner, ANOTHER piece of paper, ANOTHER watch, another loose CD, a ring, one, two, three FOUR remote controls, an empty diet coke can, a blockbuster receipt, a little packet of single-serve Crystal Lite mix (raspberry ice), a bottle of fancy air freshener (orange chamomile sage) that Kitty gave me, another piece of stationery for which I couldn’t find an envelope, a pair of purple earmuffs (????), the laptop on which I presently type and last, but not least, an empty drinking glass that, as I marvel at this state of affairs, I’m about to pour gin in it. What the fuck!?!? I once helped my niece tidy up her room and basically that meant put all her nine hundred million toys in a box. To rectify my coffee table is going to be a vastly more complicated procedure.

And ya know what? I’m not gonna do it. I’m gonna let it get to the point where you simply cannot see any wood surface, and THEN I’ll do it.

I should mention, the coffee table has a really neat spring action so you can lift the surface and draw it towards you and thus use it as a desk or even a dining surface (well of course you wouldn’t dine off the table proper, you’d employ a plate) (well I don’t know some people might think outside that box and hey, follow your dream!).

I have a hangnail. It’s bothering me.

The remote controls, by the way, well one is for the TV, one for the DVD player, one for the stereo receiver, and one for the CD player. I have contemplated, and in fact am contemplating now, getting one of those hot SONY touch remotes that can do it all. But the notion of spending $300 on a remote just doesn’t appeal. Plus, you have to “train” it. But it’s really cool and really simple. The notion of having NOTHING on the coffee table but that is really calming. Well, that … and a gin and tonic. Duh! We’ll see.