Carrie Pilby (8 page)

Wait a second—
are
polkas Polish, or do I just think that because they both start with “Pol”? I must go to my dictionary and look this up.

This is ironclad evidence that it is important to have time to oneself during the day, as I do. If I was at some mind-numbing job for eight hours, I would not have the energy to be blazing paths in etymology as I am right now.

The dictionary describes its origin this way—and I'm not joking—“Polka, Polish woman, fem. of Polak.” Polak? My father told me—after we went to the Arts High School to see
A Streetcar Named Desire
and we were talking about Stanley Kowalski—that “Polak” was a slur people used to use before the world got more politically correct. So it's funny that polka might be the feminine of a slur.

Now that I've looked up polka, I should look up polka
dot.
I can't imagine where that one came from.

It says “one of a number of regularly spaced dots or round
spots forming a pattern on cloth.” It doesn't give an etymology, which is a real gyp, as far as I'm concerned. Oh, wait, we're not supposed to say gyp anymore, because it's short for Gypsy. It's considered offensive, like so many things.

I wonder where the term “gypsy moth” comes from. Now I have to look that up, too. I admit I have a problem.

It's defined as, “a moth having hairy caterpillars that eat foliage and are very destructive to trees.” That is so flattering! If I were a Gypsy, I wouldn't be as concerned about gyp as I was about gypsy moth.

I really must put this dictionary away. It's got so many treasures inside that I can't stop plucking them out. Saying I'm just going to look up one word is like saying I'm going to eat just one potato chip, or that I'm going to open up the NPR Christmas catalogue and order just one leatherbound listeners' diary and pen set.

Suddenly my phone rings. I hope against hope it'll be someone I know. Usually it's a telemarketer or a wrong number.

I don't recognize the number but I might as well see who it is. I wait until the third ring to pick it up. There is such a thing as being fashionably late with phone calls. One ring is desperate; two rings is too soon; and four rings is risky. I wonder if
Cosmo
has written about this.

“Hello, ma'am. Is the head of the household in?”

“No,” I say. “Big Bruno is out at the construction site. But little old me might be able to help.” Sexists!

“Well, ma'am, my name is John B. Robertson, and I'm calling to give you a great offer. Because of your excellent credit rating, you are invited to a free luncheon during which you can choose to take home either a new Sony video camera or a weekend vacation for two. All you have to do is answer a few questions and then attend the three-hour session. Can I have your name?”

“Mary Jane.”

He laughs. “Could I have your real name?”

“Mary Jane is my real name. Jane is my last name.”

“Oh,” he says. “I'm sorry, ma'am. It's just that we get a lot of wise guys. Could you please tell me where you live?”

“Down the drain.”

“I should have known you weren't telling the truth.”

“If it's any consolation, I wasn't lying. I was
joking.
”

“I see. Do you think that you can tell me your real name?”

“I think so.”

“Okay.”

“Anne Sexton.”

“Thank you.” I guess he's writing this down. “Address?”

I give him the address of the coffee bar where Ronald the Rice-Haired Milquetoast works. He could use the fan mail.

“Now I need to ask you where your income falls. We're asking you to select from two choices. Would you say it's A, less than $30,000 a year, or B, $30,000 or more?”

“A trillion dollars.”

“Okay, so that would be B, $30,000 or more. When you go away on vacation, do you go A, within a half hour, B, within two hours, C, within eight hours, or D, more than eight hours away?”

“The question is worded improperly because if the correct answer is A, then the correct answers are also B and C. If your vacation is within a half hour, that also means that it's within two hours and eight hours. And A is a dumb answer, anyway, because no one takes a vacation to a half hour away. Especially in the 212 area code to which you are dialing. At rush hour, it can take a half hour to go from Christopher Street to Canal Street. Has anyone ever taken choice A, a half hour away?”

“Not too often.”

“Then eliminate it.”

“That's a good idea, ma'am. I'll pass that on to my supervisor.”

“I appreciate that, John,” I say. “Hey, John, tell me something. Where are you calling from?”

“Out in Arizona.”

“Yeah, most telemarketers usually call from out West. It's gotten cold here already. Is it nice out there?”

“It's not too bad.”

“What kind of salary do they pay you?”

“Um…”

“Do you have any kids?”

“I don't—”

“How do you feel about organized religion?”

There's a click. He's hung up.

I think I'm the first person in telecommunications history to make a telemarketer hang up on her. That alone should clinch me the MacArthur prize.

 

I actually kind of wish John hadn't hung up, though. For a telemarketer, he wasn't so bad. Maybe he hung up by accident. Maybe he'll call again.

A minute later, the phone does ring. But it turns out it's my father.

“How are you?” I ask.

“I'm fine,” he says. “I'm in Luxembourg City. How are you?”

“Pretty good,” I say. “I'm at home, in a tiny village in the States, sometimes referred to as ‘The Village.'”

“It sounds charming.”

“It is, sometimes.”

“And how are the other village dwellers?” Dad asks. “Have you met anyone new…socially?”

My father has never come right out and asked about roman
tic relationships, and I've never told him anything. I certainly never told him about Professor Harrison.

I wonder what it's like to be a father of a daughter and know that eventually, she is going to be defiled in some way. It may take thirteen years, or seventeen years, or thirty-one, but sooner or later, your princess is going to have a prince's jewels in her silk pillow. I guess you either have to not think about it or pretend it doesn't exist. Like headcheese.

“No one special,” I say.

“But you're going to try to make new friends, aren't you?”

“Sure,” I say. “Hey, when are you coming for Thanksgiving?”

He hesitates.

Uh-oh.

“Well, honey, there's been a change of plans,” he says. “I have to be traveling that entire week. They don't have Thanksgiving in Europe. I absolutely promise I'll come for Christmas.”

I'm disappointed. There were also two years during which I stayed at college for Thanksgiving instead of coming home to the city because Dad was abroad. He works for an investment bank, analyzing foreign companies, and he travels a lot of the time. Staying at school over break wasn't so bad; I actually met some nice people from my dorm who also were there over break, mostly students from out West who didn't want to go home for just four days. But I can't complain because usually my dad tries his best with holidays. He knows I don't see many relatives and that holidays are one of the things that are important to me.

“You have my word on Christmas,” Dad says. “No matter what. I'd never let you down on Christmas.”

“I know.”

“But I don't want you to be alone on Thanksgiving. I have some friends who'd be happy to have you over.”

“I don't want to be someone's charity case.”

“Come on. I'll make a call.”

“I'm actually excited about planning the whole day alone,” I say. I do still have a few weeks until Thanksgiving to work that out.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. It'll be nice to have the break.” Not different. Just nice.

“All right.”

As I hang up, I wonder whether my father is distant because he feels guilty about promises not kept. Like the Big Lie. But maybe I can figure it out over Christmas.

As for Thanksgiving, it will be strange that day watching out the window as carloads of people's relatives arrive and take off. I suppose I'll try to cook a decent meal. Maybe I'll pick up a rotisserie chicken at the supermarket.

 

Hat Guy is wearing his gray hat again, but not the raincoat. It's too sunny for him to get away with the raincoat, I suppose. He's sitting in the window of the coffee shop where Ronald the Rice-Haired Milquetoast works when I pass by. He couldn't have known I was coming. Could he?

Two can play at that game.

I double back, head into the shop and order cranberry tea. Ronald is on the job. He smiles as he hands it to me. “How's it going?” he asks. I'm too busy to talk to him, so I mumble something and grab a table by the window with my back to Hat Guy. Now, instead of him following me, I'm following him.

But I guess he's not, because he finishes whatever he's drinking, crushes his cup and gets up to leave. I briefly catch a glimpse of the books he's toting.

At the top of each, it says, “Piano/guitar/vocals.” They're Broadway songbooks. The day I saw him in the subway station muttering, he must have been running lines or singing to himself.

I get up to get napkins, but really to listen to Ronald and Hat Guy's conversation.

Ronald asks him, “How's the new pad?”

“Good,” Hat Guy says. “It's good.” He shuffles his songbooks to avoid dropping them.

“See you.” Ronald nods, and Hat Guy walks out the door.

I finish my tea and hand the mug to Ronald.

“That was Cy,” Ronald says. “He lives around the corner.” I don't say anything, so he continues. “Cy just moved here. Just got an acting job off-Broadway. He used to have to come in all the way from South Jersey for auditions.” When I still don't say anything, Ronald adds, “It's really funny.”

Hey, pal, if I need to be told, then it isn't.

 

In the evening, it's quiet in my apartment, and I feel alone. I know it's my fault. I have to push myself more.

There must be something or someone out there to challenge me.

I heave open my window and stick my head out to breathe fresh air. I notice an elderly man walking by in an old-fashioned suit and cap. He reminds me of this kid in my elementary school, Jimmy Miller, who came in one year for Halloween dressed up as the principal, in a ratty suit and cap. He got sent home. I think that we always remember kids from elementary school best by something bad they did or something bad that happened to them. Even though I was concentrating on being the kid who got straight A's and who could recite every major presidential speech and who was the only one to know all four verses of the “Star-Spangled Banner,” I also remember other students by their titles: David Rosner, the boy who threw up in gym; Sandi Anthony, the girl who had to go to the hospital after a projector fell on her head; Ken Meltzer, the boy who wet his pants two days in a row. No one ever forgets the kids who threw
up or wet their pants in school. Someday I'm going to see one of them in the
New York Times
wedding section, and I'm going to wonder if their new husband or wife knows the story, and whether I should write and tell them. I wonder what it's like to know something about someone that their spouse doesn't know, like what they were like in first grade.

I take a last whiff of air. It feels cool, crisp and inexplicably tentative, like there's a subtle harshness creeping in. It feels almost as if it's trying to transform into a solid.

The next evening, the newscasters say we are in for a major snowstorm.

The reports get more and more dire. On the radio, the jazz station DJ says in his soothing voice that we should expect four to six inches. On the six o'clock news, they say six to eight. At eleven, they say a foot. This excites me somehow.

Before I go to bed, I gaze up at the streetlight. It's not snowing yet, but it will. I curl up and drift into a confident sleep. I am excited to see what the world will look like when I wake up.

 

In the morning, everything is quiet except the sounds of motors in the distance. A sheer white light streams in through my window, and I know what there is to know: Everything's canceled.

I look out at the naked trees, thin fortresses of snow built up on each branch. I have to admit, it's beautiful. Just enjoying the
view would be another Petrov-pleasing activity. I climb onto my windowsill, which I outfitted with soft black throw-pillows some time ago, and hug my knees. I rest my back against the side of the sill. I can barely make out the apartment across the street, as the snow is still falling, the flakes small but darting fast in zigzag patterns. Even though I can't see my neighbors across the way, I think about how lucky they are to be huddling inside, listening to music, drinking hot cider or reading on the couch. I think of David and his fireplace, even though I don't want to. I wonder what he's doing now, if he ever thinks, at least once, of me and the things we did together. I wonder if I should call him sometime, just in case. But whenever I passed him on campus after the relationship ended, he wouldn't look at me. For a second, I wonder if, now that I'm older, I could say the things to him that he wanted me to say. But I still don't think I can. They're the kind of things someone else would say, someone different than I. And it's a matter of principle, anyway. If I gave in and did something that made me uncomfortable just because I was pressured to, I'd just be as bad as everyone else.

Besides, if that's what he wanted most out of a relationship, I'm sure he found it in someone else by now. Or maybe not. After all, he was still single into his early forties.

I suppose I also should not admit that I miss him. Or more, the way I felt at the time.

 

I read in the window for some of the morning, and in the afternoon, when I turn on the TV, it's snowing on
General Hospital.
It's amazing how soap opera producers have such prognostic abilities. I wonder if they have their own forecasters.

On the screen, the characters hash out their affairs and illegitimate babies and amnesiac former lovers above typed white letters that scroll slowly:

Then, the “Special Report” art flashes. A newscaster blathers about the “blizzard,” and behind him there's footage of people waiting in line at supermarkets. I can't remember any snowstorm in my nineteen years of life that stopped enough milk and eggs from getting through or prevented people from reaching the nearest store, yet, they act like they have to stockpile a month's worth of food. I think maybe what happened was that once there was a snowstorm in the 1930s that was so bad that people couldn't get groceries for days, so now, every time we might get a little precipitation, they act like Armageddon is coming. It's sort of like the old people who hide all their money under the mattress because they grew up in the Depression when the banks blew their life savings. But I think the more likely reason is that people enjoy pretending there's a crisis just to show off how prepared they are. Hey! Look at me! The boards on my windows are bigger'n yours! In my driveway, I got a four-by-four, and in my pantry,
canned yams!

 

I decide I'm going to enjoy the rest of the storm, trite as that may be. The Inaccuweather forecast says the snow could keep up into the night. I'll take full advantage. I'll make cocoa, swirling with cream; I'll curl up under mountains of comforters, light a couple of candles, keep the television on and hide away from the destruction.

During the 5 p.m., 5:30 p.m., 6 p.m., and 6:30 p.m. newscasts (molest me if I'm wrong, but aren't there too many newscasts?), the mayor can't seem to keep away from the microphones. “We are advising anyone who doesn't have to be out, not to go out,”
he says. “The roads are icy and slippery, and there have already been serious accidents.” He is wearing the Politician State of Emergency Rolling up My Sleeves Outfit. For those unfamiliar with the getup, the Politician State of Emergency Rolling up My Sleeves Outfit (PSERMSO) is anything informal that is designed to show viewers just how cool a politician is in a crisis, how difficult this problem is for him, and how willing he is to roll up his sleeves and work with the rank and file. In the Northeast, the standard PSERMSO is a baseball cap bearing the name of the local favorite team, plus jeans and a tucked-in shirt. In the South, the shirts are polo. And we see the PSERMSOs not just during blizzards, but “hurrikins,” as they call them in Looosiana.

The phone rings.

I hope it's someone I know. I want to talk to someone during the storm. I wait, then pick up the phone on the third ring.

“Hello,” the caller asks, “are you Carrie Palby?”

“What might I have won,” I say tiredly.

“Actually, I'm calling from Lerman Temporaries. We're trying to set up some temps for the next few weeks because our clients are really busy. Do you have either Wednesday or Friday night free for an assignment?”

Oops! “I guess either one,” I say quickly. My feet are cold, so I pull them up, under the comforter. I get scheduled for Wednesday.

On
World News Tonight,
the anchor mentions the blizzard. Sometimes I worry that national news is too Northeast-centric. I'd like to do a study to see if a storm in Connecticut and an equivalent storm in Georgia get equal coverage. There are a great many things I would do a study on if I had the time, materials and funding. It bothers me that I can't. I wonder if others are irked by this, this incessant drive to plumb a million things and the inability to delve adequately into any one of them.

 

When the excitement has calmed down some, I decide I've put off placing my personal ad long enough. There's a
Weekly Beacon
box around the corner. I pull a coat over my sweat clothes and head out.

Outside, it's frosty. For a few seconds, I stop. I stand in the middle of the street, surrounded by plowed-up white stuff. The city is as quiet as it ever gets. When flakes pass in front of the streetlight, they light up in yellow for a second. I look into different people's windows, at their soft lighting and blue flashes of TV. These people are my neighbors and I know not one of them. Why?

I try to make out what people are watching on TV. It's too hard to tell. I notice that the lights are off in the apartment of the couple across the street.

Once I'm back home, I slip under my comforter and open the
Beacon
to the back. There are all sorts of ads for female escort services, photos of big-busted women who pretend they really enjoy posing in front of a camera. How men can get turned on by something that's so obviously fake, I'll never know. And there are a ton of these ads, so there are literally hundreds of men who want to pay for this kind of cheap, meaningless thrill. They could even be men I went to school with or stand in line next to at the supermarket. There's simply no way to tell. It's depressing, but I suppose it only proves that men really are from another planet. I never wanted to believe that. But there are some things that just aren't fair, or as they should be in life, as much as you want them to be. Like that thing about there being one right person in the world for everyone. I believed that when I was little, but it's not scientific, and even though I have maybe fifteen or twenty more years ahead of me to find out for sure, I did go through four years at college and found no one. It makes more sense, mathematically, that there are negative-four people in the
world who are right for someone like me, and about six who are right for a busty twenty-two-year-old girl who's beautiful and sprightly and outgoing, so it averages to one for each person. But it really isn't.

The most concrete evidence for men being from another planet is the difference between the personal ads from women and men. As I wander through the “Women Seeking Men,” I notice that the women list the following qualities to describe themselves: smart, sensitive, love animals, love long walks on the beach, love museums, love books. They sound like kind, interesting people. The men don't list their hobbies; they stick more to specifying what they want, which is someone “sexy” and “vivacious.” What's funny is, the men don't care to hide their
own
visual inadequacies. Two of them say they “look like Anthony Edwards,” which just means they're bald. They're lucky that a bald guy got on TV and got famous so they can convey this in some oblique way. I see there is one guy who wants a woman who is “Rubenesque.” Thank God for variety.

I look at the different categories. There's a category for married men. I don't know why a newspaper would condone that. But I guess there's a market for it, and they're the only one to fill it. Still, that doesn't make it right.

I scan all the ads more closely. There's something else that strikes me as strange.

It's the very high number of people who declare that they “enjoy working out.”

Huh?

I can see enjoying playing a sport, or enjoying movies or enjoying traveling, but there is—and I'm not being funny here—absolutely not one thing that could possibly be enjoyable about working out. I'm not even talking about a difference of opinion or taste or an activity preference. I'm saying that working out is something that you do to tone muscles. It doesn't feel pleasur
able; it doesn't involve competition. It involves repetition. There is nothing at all interesting about it. The joy may come when you're all done, because you know that you've done something good for yourself. Or, the joy may come weeks later when you flex your abs in the mirror and fantasize about members of the opposite sex scrambling to you at the beach. But there is nothing enjoyable about the actual process of doing exercises. Writing that you enjoy working out is like writing “enjoy taking vitamins” or “enjoy annual physical exam” or “enjoy colonoscopy.”

I've also noticed that people talk about working out constantly these days, whether it's where they work out, how much they work out, or, most important, how guilty they are that they haven't been working out and how they're going to work out tomorrow. Maybe when it shows up in someone's personal ad, it's a sneaky way for the person to tell you how in shape they are. Or maybe it's a clue that they're
not.

There's a whole code to these ads.

I skim more of them. I learn all about guys seeking women who are vivacious, guys seeking women who are sexy, guys who like sports, guys who like music (who doesn't?) and guys who like “hanging out.” Not all the ads are irritating, but some are just so bland that they seem the same. How am I supposed to differentiate?

Then something catches my eye.

There's an ad that says, “SWM, 26, engaged—but looking for more. I've met my best friend for life; now I want to fool around.”

How terrible!

The poor girl. She is so sure she's getting this prince of a guy. And what of him? Why is he marrying her if he's not attracted to her? Is someone holding a gun to his head?

I move on, trying to find anyone in the ads who sounds inter
esting. I'm not very successful. When I finish up, I want to throw the paper away. But I just can't get the “engaged” ad out of my mind.

It makes me angrier and angrier.

And I can do something about it.

What?

I envision a scene in which I bring the ad to the couple's wedding. When the minister asks for objections, I wave the paper in the air and say, “He's advertising to cheat!” Of course, I don't think they really ask that anymore. Probably because today, there's so much cheating and lying going on that everyone would have an objection.

What they should do is advertise weddings in advance in the newspaper, like those legal ads that note that the state will seize this or that property if someone doesn't come forward.

I'm going to get on the Internet and find that ad. I'm going to pretend I'm engaged, and I'm going to meet this guy. I can't change all men—or women, for that matter (I wonder if there actually
are
other women who will answer this ad, and why)—but I can change this guy, who is the biggest jerk I've encountered, and I haven't even encountered him yet!

There was a phone icon next to the ad, which means you can actually call to hear the person's voice. Good idea.

I pick up the phone and dial the 900 number for the personals.

“Welcome to the
Weekly Beacon
personals. You must be eighteen or over to use this service. If you are under eighteen, please hang up now.”

Whew—just made it. I haven't felt this great since I got into the Westinghouse Science Project semifinals.

“At the sound of the beep, you will begin being charged for this call.
Beep.
Please listen carefully to these instructions before making a selection.”

Oh no. This is costing me $2.50 a minute and they want me to sit through instructions. What a rip.

“To answer a specific ad, press 1.”

I do.

“I'm sorry. That character is not recognized.”

I press 1 again.

“Welcome to the
Weekly Beacon
personals.”

Look how they extort money. I don't know what to do about this. But it seems like if I tried to set right everything I saw that was wrong in the world, I would never have time to do anything else. I assume someone else will complain about this rip-off, but I guess that's what everyone assumes and why nothing ever gets done.