I Know What I'm Doing (14 page)

“Yes.”

I positioned myself by the keypad, ready to take her orders.

“You got a couch? Sit on it.”

Confused, I sat down.

“Now, ma’am, take deep breaths.”

“Sherri, what does this have to do with—?”

“DEEP. BREATHS!”

“Okay. Okay.”

“Now. Was he good to you?

“Who?”

“Your ex-husband.”

“Yes. He was great in a lot of ways but I don’t think marriage was for me.”

“Oh. Well, I was cheated on. If your next husband ever tells you he’s just taking on an extra shift at work, don’t believe it.”

“Okay. Good to know.”

“All you have to know are two things. First, love is love. You can find love in friendships and mostly love exists in abundance in the world but people act like there isn’t enough of it. We’re in charge of that. I can love all I want. Can’t stop me.”

I sat attentively awaiting her next piece of wisdom. Sherri actually made me feel better.

“And what’s the second thing?”

“Star. Star. Star.”

Star star star? I tried to figure out what that could mean.

“Like, as in astrology? You mean, look to the stars? Believe in something bigger than me? Or is it more like a message of follow the North Star to my own personal freedom?”

“No, ma’am. Hit star star star on the keypad and that will silence the alarm.”

“Oh.”

I got off the phone with Sherri, thankful that she bent the rules for me. And I realized that we have our Oprahs and our Deepak Chopras but every once in a while inspiration is just a flawed alarm system and a phone call away. I would buy a Sherri’s Words of Wisdom Page-A-Day calendar in a heartbeat. And even though it was only a code, I’m choosing to believe in the wisdom of Star Star Star. Can’t stop me.

12

RENT (NO, NOT THE BROADWAY MUSICAL)

It’s easy to underestimate the real cost of home ownership.

—SUZE ORMAN

H
i. My name is Jen. And I’m a renter. Wow. Unlike alcoholism, admitting that I’m a renter doesn’t feel like the first step toward recovery. I still feel shame. I do not own my home. In fact I don’t own the following things that came with my rental: the refrigerator that makes three kinds of crushed ice; the washer and dryer; the dishwasher; the garbage disposal; the toilets; the rainfall showerheads in both bathrooms; the dimmer lighting; or the hardwood floors. None of these things are mine. Actually, I don’t even rent a house. I rent a condo. I want to rent. I know I don’t have “equity” but I also don’t have “debt.” Your friends will tell you that you need to start investing in something that can give back to you. Then they’ll tell you about the homes that they own; that the pipes are old, there’s mold in the ceiling, and every other day the sewer drainage system backs up but that it’s all “worth it.” When is the worth it part? When you’re seventy-five and finally own your home outright only to leave it to move into assisted living?

I only live in my home about two hundred days out of the year and I’m so glad that I don’t even have to think about it when I’m not there. If the building loses power—it’s not my problem. If my garbage disposal backs up, I tattle on it to the building manager and by the end of the day it’s fixed. A doorman is sitting at the front desk twenty-four hours a day. If an ex-boyfriend comes to tell me that he loves me—he cannot get upstairs. I leave photos and names with my doorman for the two exceptions. Just in case. My mailbox is inside, safely secured behind locked doors so no shitty neighborhood kids can hit it with a bat or fill it with shaving cream on Halloween. I have an elevator. Do you have an elevator in your house? You do? Well, screw you, then. Okay, but, Jen, you don’t OWN it. You’re throwing money away, you say. No. I’m just giving my money to different people. Homeowners give their money to a bank once a month. Once a month I give my money to the nice blond lady downstairs, who then gives it to a bank.

I’m an independent woman but not that independent. There’s a gym in my building and a coffee machine in the lobby. It feels like living in a hotel, and since I do that for half of my year, when my home feels like a hotel it feels like home. Houses are scary. There are creaky stairs for ghosts to walk on; attics and basements for monsters to hide in. You never see movies where a ghost haunts a brand-new condo. There’s nothing satisfying about a ghost dimming the lights or changing the setting on the central air-conditioning. And since I was the first one to live in my place—there’s no history. If a ghost tried to haunt me claiming that she lived there first, I could totally call bullshit.

Another bonus about my living situation is that the doorman who works the night shift is studying to be an EMT and he knows the Heimlich maneuver. I made a pact with him that if I ever call downstairs and I sound like I’m choking it’s because I’m choking and he has full permission to enter my apartment and maneuver the crap out of my Heimlich. If I keep on living alone, I will probably die in this condo. I’ll definitely hit my head on the tub someday and then three days later a cat will eat my face. I don’t have a cat, but when a single woman dies alone I hear that cats magically appear.

After living on the first floor with an enticing-to-murderers big picture window and then another apartment with a loud toddler clomping around upstairs—my brand-new condo in Los Angeles was a welcome haven and heaven. The building manager took pity on me when she saw how shell-shocked I looked from sleepless nights because of someone else’s baby. She offered me a great price on a top-floor unit—no babies above me unless there are some ninja SWAT team babies that climb rooftops. So far so good. I haven’t heard any.

I’ve never been a talk-to-my-neighbors kind of girl. If I’m home, I’m usually sleeping, showering, or completely zoned out on the couch, not in the mood to talk to anyone. I would have sucked at living in the 1940s when people had nothing to do except knock on each other’s doors and borrow sugar or be friendly. I like to know my neighbors’ names, and starting to figure out their schedules comforts me, but that’s it. I sit at home thinking,
Okay. Michelle next door is home. If I smelled carbon
monoxide I could knock and ask her if she smells it too
.
I could also ask her, “Wait, does carbon monoxide even have a smell?”

Back at the old West Hollywood building, I threw a swinging New Year’s party complete with homemade sangria. Our neighbors, who had planned to stay inside and have a couple’s night, got bored with each other by eleven p.m. and knocked on my door wondering if they could join in and bring some of their Veuve Clicquot. When I’m tipsy I’m everyone’s best friend. “Come on in! Oh my God! It’s . . .”

“Dana and Steve.”

“Right! Dana and Steve! I love you guys! I never see you!”

I’m not lying when I talk like this. I’m accessing the deepest part of me that truly loves all people.

The next morning I woke up with the foggiest memory that I’d gone out of my comfort zone. A text from Dana said,
JEN! SO NICE TO HANG LAST NIGHT! LIKE YOU SAID, YOU TEND TO HIDE AT HOME WITH CANDLES LIT SO WE WILL BE KNOCKING ON YOUR DOOR A LOT MORE OFTEN, FRIENDLY NEIGHBOR!

I pretended to have diarrhea for at least eight months until they got tired of knocking.

The beauty of New Condo was that I was one of the first people to move into the building. There was no bumping into next-door or across-the-hall neighbors carrying boxes or new lamps. No forced new friends like in college. I lived alone in my little corner of the sixth and top floor for months. Until I opened my door one day and seconds later the door down the hall whipped open as if someone had been standing behind it waiting, listening for a sign of life from my place. I was face-to-face with a sort of odd duck of a man who looked like he wasn’t born but rather drawn to life like a
Simpsons
character. He had too much phlegm in his nose, mouth, throat, and teeth.

“Hi! I’m Billy! What’s your name?”

“Jen.”

“Hi, Jennifer. I’m Billy.”

He seemed drunk. He seemed off. Not mentally challenged, but off.

“Well, nice to meet you. I heard you open your door so I decided to say hi.”

I went on my way down the hall as he shouted, “Let’s have wine sometime. Stop by anytime or I’ll stop by your place. Stop by later for wine!”

I didn’t turn around. I kept walking. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. This could not be happening. I hoped that was the last I would see of Billy and that nobody would be having wine. Why did the nice building manager lady have to put him down the hall from me? A wildly private single woman? Can’t he live down the hall from a nice family and bother them? That’s what people make families—to have backup against the weird neighbors of the world.

Two nights later I was home, reading in bed at nine p.m. A luxury I hadn’t had with the loud toddler above my head at the old West Hollywood place. I heard a knock at the door. Not one knock but a nonrhythmic series of knocks, and my doorbell was ringing too. Not once but in tandem with the knock. Knock. Knock. Ring. Ring. Ring. Knock. Knock. Knock. Ring. Knock. Ring.

I assumed it was FedEx. That’s usually how they knock and I was expecting a package. I opened the door without consulting the peephole. It was Billy.

“Do you hear that?”

“No.”

“Your next-door neighbor’s smoke alarm is going off and it’s driving me crazy. Can you talk to her?”

“I don’t know her. Everyone’s smoke alarm goes off the first time they use the stove. This is a new building. It’s going to be fine.”

“Am I bothering you?”

“It’s fine but I was in bed reading.”

“I’m going to go outside until it stops.”

I nodded and shut the door. He seemed high. He smelled like pot. He still sounded like a drunken cartoon. I really hoped he was just an anxious first-time mover and he would calm the fuck down. I didn’t like where this was heading so far.

Exactly twenty-four hours later, the off-rhythm door knocking and doorbell ringing started again. I tiptoed to my peephole. Billy. I watched him turn around and walk back into his apartment, go inside, and come back out with pieces of paper and a Sharpie. He pressed the pieces of paper up against my door—they covered the peephole so I could no longer see him but I could hear the loud squeak of the marker writing something on the paper. When he put pen to paper it sounded like a hammer to a nail. Everything he did was loud. I started to pine for a ghost—at least with ghosts you aren’t quite sure if they’re really there. There was no question that Billy—who didn’t seem “all there”—was really there.

I ran into my bedroom, shut the door, and called my friend and former coworker from
Chelsea Lately
Chris Franjola. He lives in the building next door. I whispered, “You have to come over here but covert-style.” Chris and I hatched a plan. After Billy tired of taping things to my door and knocking, Chris took the elevator up to the sixth floor. I instructed him to creep down the hall and if he saw Billy not to move. He was only to enter my apartment without Billy seeing him. I left my door unlocked. Chris made his way in and I gently shut the door so that Billy wouldn’t be able to detect any sign of new life at my place. Chris was to pretend that he was my boyfriend who was pissed at all of this door knocking. He waited ten minutes and said, “I don’t think he’s coming back.”

“Oh, Chris. You’ve never been a woman. Our instincts are never wrong. He’s coming back in five minutes.”

I was right. Billy started furiously knocking again. It was Chris’s turn to open the door angrily and deliver the performance I had written for him.

“Who are you?”

“Oh. I’m Billy. Is Jen here?”

“She’s in bed, Billy. WE were in bed, Billy. You don’t knock on this door like that this time of night or any time of night.”

“Jen told me she just reads in bed alone every night.”

Chris started to waver. “She said that? That’s pathetic-sounding.”

I kicked Chris from behind the door whispering, “No I didn’t. Keep going.”

Chris continued. “If you don’t stop bothering her, and us, we will have to call the police and we don’t want to have to do that.”

“I . . . I just wanted to give Jen tickets to a comedy show. Here.”

Billy handed Chris the pile of papers that had once been taped to my door and retreated.

They were printouts of free tickets that Billy had for shows at the Hollywood Improv, a place where I regularly perform.

After Chris left, I sat in bed worrying that perhaps I, er, Chris had been too strong with Billy. Maybe Billy was back in his apartment feeling sad and wondering why he never fits in. I felt like a prisoner in my own home—racked with sympathy for Billy and guilt and pity for myself. I was having a classic codependent victim/martyr breakdown. I sent an e-mail to my building superintendent and basically told on Billy. I told her that I want this to be a home; I’m on television sometimes and can’t have people stalking me. I told her that I would consider breaking my lease if something wasn’t done. She wrote back that she totally understood and she would love to talk to me about it further face-to-face if I could come to her office. Ugh. Isn’t e-mail supposed to have saved us all from personal confrontation?

When I was a young Catholic girl I had to go to confession twice a year, and in the 1980s my church decided to forgo the kneeling behind a screen anonymously talking to the priest for a FACE-TO-FACE confession. It’s like therapy without a comfortable couch or prescriptions. I don’t like face-to-face. I don’t even like open-faced sandwiches.

I reluctantly knocked on the building superintendent’s door the next day. I brought her muffins because it seemed like something that nice, well-adjusted people do. She explained to me that Billy spends his days in her office talking nonstop and offering her free tickets to comedy shows too. I’m not a fan of “it happens to me too” as a solution for a problem. I told her that that sounds horrifying, and might I add at least she gets to leave work at the end of the day. This man LIVES down the hall from where I LIVE. She explained that he’s harmless. I explained to her that I’m not afraid he’ll murder me. I’m afraid he’ll talk to me.