Gently Blogging

Hmm... turns out I'm not so great at this blogging-on-a-regular-basis thing. The only time I really get the urge is when I want to procrastinate, LIKE NOW. I should be reading this Ursula LeGuin book for this essay I'm working on but the book is... it's good but it feels so distant. Her style of writing is so removed that I can't generate much enthusiasm for it.

Every time it rains in LA my apartment turns into the equivalent of a Tahitian shack. (OK, so it's not that bad--it does stay upright in hard winds.) The floor of the hallway is littered with various mixing bowls and buckets collecting water that drips from the a/c vent. The manager of my building has sent the repair guy here so many times now and he either makes it better for a little while, or fucks it up even more for the next time.

Let's talk about Debra, the building manager, for a sec. She's a lithe lady in her mid-upper 40s with dyed chestnut-auburn hair and always meticulously applied dark orange lipstick that looks nice with her tanned skin. She's attractive and strange. Nearly every time she sees me, she compliments me on my clothes. For a while, when I used to carry around this beaded vintage clutch with rose and cherry designs on it, she would stop me every time she saw me (and it) and marvel, I mean really MARVEL at this bag, fingering it and smiling and even sighing a little bit like a person would over an unrequited crush. About a year ago, I put the purse into retirement (cherries are so everywhere now) but I contemplated giving it to her. It's still a possibility, I suppose. Maybe if she gets the hallway leaks permanently fixed, I'll give her the bag.

Her strangeness is due to the way she conducts conversations. She's very friendly one moment ("Oh, I just love that bag!") and the next second she's totally all business, saying nothing more than "OK," and then she'll turn on her heel, exit the building, get into her gold SUV and carefully, with great control, back down the apron of the parking garage, not waving or looking back at the building. It's not an angry OK or a rude OK, it's just "this is over." And, in a way, I'm grateful for this exit because who needs the wierd "who's going to stop this small-talk crap" with the building manager? There's no awkwardness, no tiny steps towards the door or flitting eyes or "well..." It's just "I'm out of here" from Debra.

I'm pretty sure that when she showed me this apartment, somehow she mentioned she was divorced. Either way, whether I actuallly know this as a fact or not, Debra is divorced. I just know it. She's kind of got the classic middle-aged lady "I'm divorced" vibe. I know I'm not really going out on a limb here by assuming that--half of everyone's divorced anyway. But here's the evidence: For one, most married women her age just don't look that good. Even in LA. Unless she's of the trophy-wife variety or a highly successful businesswoman who need to look like a chipped piece of ice with make-up on every second of the day, the married women in her late 40s tends to favor Keds and denim jumpers with maybe some "funky" earrings, very little make-up. Debra is not like this. She's always dressed well, in expensive earth-toned pants or crisp jeans, with her hair blown out and then obviously curled with those big rollers.

Anyway, I get the feeling if you asked Debra if she believed in true love she'd snort and look at you like you were an idiot. I get the feeling she was probably married for about 15 years, and every year was disastrous. And now that he's finally out of her life, she can live it like she wants, dammit. I notice that whenever she's come to the apartment to talk to us about something or another, she talks more to me, and less to Dylan. Now, it could be because I make more of the phonecalls regarding the apartment and its leaks and what not, and it oculd be because she met me first. But I get the sense that she talks more to me because she just likes women better.

All that said, I could see her having a son that she would lavish the world on.

OK, so I've talked about my building manager enough for today. But she is fascinating! Aren't all building managers? In a way?