THE LOVE THY NEIGHBOR CHRONICLES - PART I

INTRODUCTION

Before I begin, I would like to first clarify that the following is not meant to be an amusing anecdote that pokes fun at the short comings of another. Nor is it meant to be a cautionary tale about the difficulties of outer borough dwelling. No, I’ve written the following piece for one reason, and one reason alone. I would like the world to know that when my body turns up, bludgeoned to death with a half empty Jameson bottle – it could have only been one person;

The drunk bitch that lives across the hall.

There’s only one other apartment in my building, and in the last six years, I’ve seen a lot of neighbors come and go. They’ve mostly been recent college grads – fresh from NYU – burdened with an illusion that they’re somehow special. On average, it takes them about a year to realize that they are not and that their degree in Media Studies has qualified them to do approximately nothing. I’ve always felt their pain and done my best to foster a pleasant neighborhood atmosphere between our two apartments. But despite my best efforts, they inevitably pack up and head back to wherever they came from as soon as their lease runs up. It was particularly sad to see the last tenants leave – the hippy couple in the master bedroom to pursue their dream of running a guided tour through the Alaskan wilderness, and their roommate, the lesbian bicycle enthusiast, to search for a neighborhood with more lesbian bicycle enthusiasts.

The apartment sat vacant for months – that is until kismet would bring my face to face with a she-devil that would torment me for the rest of my days (or at least until one of us decides to move out).

CHAPTER 1 – THE HOUSE HUNTERS

I remember well the afternoon when I first laid eyes on our new neighbors. It was a particularly lazy Saturday afternoon. I had spent the day in my underwear watching reruns of Tabitha Takes Over. I was about four episodes into a day long marathon, when I heard voices coming from the hallway. It was two female voices– accompanied by a man whose nasally baritone I recognized to be that of my landlord. I ran to the door as quietly as possible, and reached the peephole just in time to see the back of group’s heads as they opened the door.

The landlord gave them a tour of the two bedrooms, making sure to point out the fresh coat of paint and the recently refinished hard wood floors. Ponytail 1 was tall and thin, with beautiful wavy auburn hair and sharply dressed considering the heat. Ponytail 2 was shorter and stouter, with shoulder length brown hair. I never once saw their faces – but imagined them to be two beautiful young ladies– eyes mistakenly full of optimism. I did the same thing I always do when I first spy on new neighbors – I allowed my mind to wander, imagining us becoming best friends, walking arm and arm back from a night on the town. We’d lament about a time before we knew one another, right before we discuss who’s bringing what to our weekly neighbor potluck.

When I returned to reality, I realized how creepy this all was– a grown man in his underwear, breathing slowly as he spied on two young ladies through his peephole. It was terribly One Hour Photos of me. Besides, I told myself, becoming friends with the neighbors had bad news written all over it. I have trouble blowing off the friends I have now. What would I do with friends who lived across the hall – friends who could hear me watching bad reality television when I was suppose to be at their Murder Mystery Party?

When I returned to the living room, I noticed the cable box had frozen, leaving a giant image of Tabatha Coffey’s puggish man-face hovering on my TV. Her glassy devils eyes were staring into me, disgust weighing down the corners of her twiggy mouth mid scowl. I stabbed at the remote to try to make the awful site go away – but it would not. Panic came over me as I envisioned having to admit to my roommate that I had voluntarily watched Tabitha Takes Over. I turned the cable box off and on, but the face remained. I unplugged the TV and plugged it back in, but the face remained. If I were a superstitious man, I would properly identified this as an omen of the ugly things yet to come.

WHY I HATE GOING TO THE DENTIST

Why must you turn my office into a house of LIES?

I hate going to the dentist. Now, I’m fully aware that this is in no way an original sentiment. Writing about how much I hate going to the dentist is just as fresh as say, a Susan Boyle reference, or commenting on how unfunny Carlos Mencia is, or talking about how the National Socialist Party is just the worst! Yes, I understand that everyone hates going to the dentist. But I really hate going. Particularly to my dentist. Because he is a creep.


My earliest memories of going to the dentist were not overly fond ones. My friends loved going to the dentist, and would regale me with tales of state of the art equipment, bubble-gum flavored fluoride, and coloring books with cartoon teeth coexisting happily with smiling toothbrushes. My father had another vision for my brothers and I. A loyal man, he had been going to the same dentist since he was in high school, which, according to my calculations, made him 120 years old. As soon as we reached teeth-cleaning age, my dad began taking us as well – very much against my mother’s wishes. She hated this dentist. Her reasons were many, but the most outstanding was the fact that he was the father of my dad’s high school girlfriend. Her disapproval was not enough to stop my father though. He would drag us far, far away to his office, which was a museum of antiquated dental machinery and outdated techniques. But what his dentist lacked in knowledge of modern dentistry, he more than made up for with his gift for gab. That man could talk – not anything of interest mind you, like say, my dad’s ex girlfriend, or why they broke up, or if she was really in a mental hospital like my mother always told us. Instead I was forced to lay there, his un-gloved hands jammed into my mouth, listening to him talk about San Antonio, or the fluffiest cloud he had seen that week.


When I got to college, my attendance at dentist became more and more sporadic. By the time I was forcibly removed from my parents insurance, I couldn’t remember the last time I had been. I wasn’t overly worried though. I was a senior, and would soon have a job and insurance of my own. My philosophy was – a year or two without going to the dentist never killed anyone – or at least according to a brief google search I did. I was looking forward to finally being able to pick my own dentist – preferably one who washed his hands and had gone to dental school sometime in the last century. Sadly, when I got my first job, my employer’s response to “when does my dental insurance start?” was something along the lines of “when it’s free."


Four or five years without going to the dentist never killed anyone right?


So after two years, I switched to a job that offered dental care. At this point I was convinced that I had no less than 10 cavities. Maybe more. As soon as I was eligible, I began asking for recommendations from my coworkers as to good dentists in the neighborhood. Jeanette, who sat across from me, recommended one that she had recently visited. “He’s a nice guy,” she said. “Older, but everything in his office is very state of the art.” I was worried about the “older” part – but comforted by the “state of the art” part.


So for the first time in five years, I made an appointment to go to the dentist. I entered the office tentatively. It had been so long, and my anxiety was shooting through the roof. His office was in Chelsea, just a couple blocks from where I worked. The place seemed nice enough. It was decorated in a manner in I have come to expect from any establishment in Chelsea – that is to say – super gaily. A big purple couch sat in the middle of a room painted with bold green horizontal stripes. I checked in with the receptionist and as I filled out my paper work, I used the techniques I had learned from watching A&E’s Obsessed to bring my anxiousness down. “Just imagine Dr. Shana here.” I said to myself. “Dr. Shana eases the pain.”


When I was done with my paper work, the dental assistant escorted me into a room to take my x rays. As I waited, she played a video on all the procedures I was going to have done on a TV monitor that was mounted a few inches from my head. Jeanette had been right – this was place state of the art. The x-rays took just a few minutes, and when she was done, all of them immediately appeared on the screen in front of me. Never before had I seen my x rays so up close and personal. I was staring into the inside of the inside of my mouth. And it was jacked.


The young woman excused herself and said that she was going to get Dr. Stan for me. I could hear him in the other room, drilling away at someone else’s mouth. I sat there, trying to avoid eye contact with the crooked insides of my mouth. “Braces for five years,” I muttered to myself “and that’s the best they could do?” The chair I was in was comfortable. Plush and reclined, I quickly found my eyes getting heavy.


“Christopher?” Someone said, shaking my shoulder.  Startled, I sprung up in the chair, nearly hitting my head on the monitor.


“Jesus!” I yelled, as I clasped my chest “I’m so sorry! I must have drifted off to sleep.” I looked up and saw a tall man standing before me. He was somewhere in his fifties, wearing a white lab coat over a brightly printed Hawaiian shirt. His head was covered with a thin coat of wild grey hair, all swept back. He had a neatly trimmed goatee and a smile plastered across his face.


“Hello Christopher” he said, taking my hand into his, “I’m Dr. Stan. Sorry I startled you.” His grasp was firm, although instead of shaking my hand, he was simply holding it in his, unmoving. “Although I’m glad you feel comfortable enough in my office to fall asleep.”


I looked at him funny. It was an odd thing to say, and he was still holding my hand. I laughed awkwardly, and slightly tried to pull my hand from his. It was useless. It belonged to him now.  As he stood there, he began to run his other hand over my arm softly. “I don’t want you to feel nervous. We’re going to take good care of you okay? You seem like a nice person and I’m going to make sure nothing happens to you. So just relax okay?” He held my hand for a second longer, smiled, and left the room.


I was slightly skeeved out. There was something very subtle about Dr. Stan’s creepiness. He was soft spoken, yet masculine. He didn’t blow me a kiss, or wink at me, or try to tweak my nipple. There was just something about the way he looked at me, the way he held my hand too long. It was as if i had just been hit on by Chuck Norris, and it did not feel pretty.


Because it was my first time in the office, Dr. Stan informed me that he would have to perform a series of tests on me so he could evaluate the state of my dental health. One of these tests involved me opening and closing my mouth repeatedly as he placed both of his hand on either said of my face.


“Hmm….yes…. I see” he said as he caressed my face. He sat down in his chair and put his glasses on. “The joint that connects your jaw bone with your skull is called your temporomandibular joint, or TMJ as we call it.”


I laughed to myself and thought,“Yeah, TMJ! More like Too…Much…Jaw….Ja….yeah I got nothing.”


“Your TMJ,” He continued, “Is very small, which can cause problems. You want to avoid opening your mouth for any long period time." He paused awkwardly, and then continued. "You know, if you’re like, eating a big sub or something.” He then opened his mouth up wide and held his hands up near his face as if he was holding an imaginary sandwich. I had seen this gesture before, but it had not been in reference to eating a hoagie.


After a thorough cleaning, Dr. Stan sent me on my merry way with a clean bill of health. Since then, I have been back to see him many times to get my biannual cleaning and a cavity or two filled. Every time is the same. I go in. Dr. Stan will walk into the room and stare at me for an uncomfortable amount of time. He will then look at my chart, and say “Christopher! That’s right. I’m so sorry, I’m terrible with names. I don’t ever forget a face though. Particularly not one as handsome as yours.”


In December, I had a checkup the same day as our office Christmas Party. As Dr. Stan tinkered in my mouth, and noticed my bow tie that I worn for the event. “I knew when I first met you,” he said with both hands in my mouth, “That you were a very elegant and dapper young man.” He then sighed. “Oh my, oh my.”


“I’m pretty sure he wants to rape me.” I later told my cousin Kelly.


Kelly rolled her eyes. “You think everyone wants to have sex with you!” (which is true. I do.) “I’m sure he’s just being nice. He’s probably just a touchy feely guy who compliments everyone like that.”


A couple weeks later, my coworker Jeanette came back from one of her appointments with Dr. Stan with blood shot eyes. “What the hell happened to you?” I asked.


She shook her hand and bit her lip. “I don’t want to talk about it.” She said
“Have you been crying?” I asked.
“YES!” She shouted. “Okay! I was crying. Dr. Stan yelled at me. He yelled at me until I started to cry. And then you know what he said to me? He said that I wasn’t even the first person he had made cry that day!”


The next time I went in, I began to notice another side to Dr. Stan. All of his dental assistants skirted around him anxiously. While he filled a cavity, he paused to address the elderly Indian woman that had been assisting him during the procedure. “Clara,” he said calmly. “Why are there no black glasses in this room? I need a pair of black glasses, and you know that there should always be a pair in every room in this office, right? Because I've told you that I need a black pair of glasses in every room how many times Clara? Maybe 100? Maybe more do you think? Well, I need you to go into the storage closet and find me a pair right now, as I’m sure there are more than enough. NOW CLARA!”


Clara nodded, and ran off to fetch his glasses like a beaten puppy. Dr. Stan sighed. “Sorry  you had to witness that,” He said to me. “It’s so hard to get these girls to do anything around here.” He paused for a moment and then pointed to the monitor above my head. “Now look at the large hole I just drilled into your tooth!” I shuttered in fear, and for once, was glad I was on his good side.


The last time I went was a couple weeks ago. We did our normal routine where he stares at me forever and forgets my name. After a quick cleaning and checkup, I was told that my teeth looked excellent and that I was free to leave. As I left, he shouted after me “Goodbye my beautiful boy!”  A couple days afterwards, I noticing my teeth were hurting. It started as a dull pain in one, and then moved throughout my entire mouth. My teeth still hurt. Every single one of them. I refuse to go back to Dr. Stan though. I don’t know what he did to me, but I’m pretty sure he hurt me on purpose as a ploy to get me back into his office. I’m sure of it. The pain I can live with. Being put molested, murdered, and dismembered with tiny dentist equipment, I cannot.

MY MOTHER THINKS I'M THE DEVIL

I’ve never been one to toot my own horn, but I think it needs to be said – as far as children go, my parents had it pretty damn good. I was by no means a perfect kid, but...no, you know what? I was perfect. I never got in trouble at school. I always got straight A’s. I never defecated into anyone’s mailbox. I mean, seriously, what more could you ask for?

My mother though – let’s just say she was never convinced. My mom was constantly working under the assumption that I was secretly up to no good. Seeing me go straight to my room after school every day, she asked my twin if I was a “chronic masturbator.” I was studying (he told her “yes” anyway). When I lost 15lbs, she swore up and down that I had an eating disorder. The doctors would later inform her that I had Mono (which I’m sure she assumed I got from tonguing truckers at nearby rest stops).

Now, ten years later, I thought that she and I had moved past this – me being a responsible adult with a good job, my own place, and a fine assortment of neckties. I found out this winter break that I was wrong. She still thinks I’m the devil.

It was several days after Christmas. My friend Ryan had just gotten into town, and my brother and I decided to celebrate by taking him out for a couple drinks. We went to a bar down the street from my parents’ house. Feeling pretty toasty and in no shape to drive, the three of us decided to return and spend the night there.

When we got home, my mother was still awake. This is nothing unusual. Now that she’s retired, she stays up all hours of the night – like a high schooler on permanent summer vacation. I decided, being the ever-gracious host, that I should make a snack for everyone to enjoy. I looked into the freezer and found a large box of microwavable taquitos – which I’ll add, looked delicious.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I will admit that I was fairly intoxicated at this point in the evening. I quickly glanced at the directions on the side of the box, which instructed me to place five taquitos on a plate, and microwave on high for 15 minutes. “15 minutes,” I thought to myself. “That sounds about right.”

Ten minutes later I returned to check on their progress. My mother, who was sitting in the next room, perked up. “It smells like you’re burning something in there!” As I entered the kitchen, I saw smoke billowing from the microwave. “Uh…nothing’s burning” I said as calmly as possible. I opened the microwave door to 5 charred taquitos – barely recognizable as anything that was once edible. Baffled, I looked again at the box. 15 minutes for cooking in a convection oven – 2 minutes for the microwave.

The smell was rancid. I immediately opened all the windows in the kitchen and turned on the fan. My mother popped her head in to see what was going on, only to find me standing next to the open back door, waving a large newspaper furiously. “Nothing to see here!” I shouted.

She was not pleased. To say the least.

I placed the plate of charred remains out on the deck and aired the kitchen out as much as possible before skirting off to bed. I woke up early the next morning to assess the damage. The entire house reeked like something awful. The stench had permeated all three floors of the house. My hopes that the smell would clear up by morning were dashed. Furthermore, the once white innards of the microwave had now been turned to what Behr paint swabs would label something like "toasted marshmellow." As I scrubbed the inside furiously, my mom and dad came down from their room.

My dad shook his head. “You’re an idiot” he said. My mother looked at me and left the room without saying anything.

“Is she still mad at me?” I asked my dad.

“Yeah, she’s pretty upset,” dad told me. “She thinks you were high and that you have a drug problem.“

“WHAT!?” I screamed. Had I actually been high, that would have been one thing. But I never smoke weed! My opinion on marijuana has always been; why smoke up when beer is so cheap and readily accessible? Only my mother could interpret a simple culinary misunderstanding as a full-blown drug addiction. I just knew by her red eyes that she had been up the entire night, crying softly to herself as she pictured me shooting heroine in a dark alley – selling weed to rich public school kids to make enough money to support my insatiable hunger for drugs. Why had I ever suggested she start watching Intervention? And why did my brother have to buy her The Wire for her birthday?

“Maybe you should apologize to her and tell her you don’t do drugs,” my dad suggested.

“I did apologize!” I screamed. “I apologized like 20 times last night!”

“Did you apologize?” my dad asked, “or did you say ‘mistakes are why God put erasers on pencils.’”

Yes, sure, I had said that. So I didn’t exactly have the strongest case for not being high, but come on!

To make matters worse, when Matt and Ryan woke up, I informed them of the situation. “What, did she find your bong?” Ryan yelled, as my mother sat in earshot. “She didn’t flush your stash did she?” He thought it was funny. My mother did not. She refused to talk to me the rest of the morning.

I stewed all day. Why did she always have to immediately jump to the worst-case scenario? I have always tried to be the perfect son. I call every week. I sent flowers on her birthday. Not once have I ever stole any appliances from the house. Are these things a druggie would do? Sure, I had fucked up. I’ll admit it. It was pretty retarded to put a bunch of tiny burritos in the microwave for 15 minutes. Clearly, I’m an idiot. But a drug problem? Where does she come up with this stuff?

I took a long shower to calm down. As I turned the water off, my dad – the constant mediator - knocked on the door.

“What?!” I screamed. “I’m naked! Go away!”

“I just want to talk to you.”

I put a towel on and opened the door.

“I talked to your mother and explained to her that you weren’t high. She knows you don’t really have a drug problem. She just worries about you. She’s a worrier. It’s how she shows love. It’s hard, with you being so far away. We just want to make sure you’re okay.”

“Fine.” I said begrudgingly.

“Now, can we put all this behind us and enjoy the rest of our holiday?”

“Fine.” I said – still begrudgingly.

“Can I get a hug?” he said – not waiting for a response to wrap his arms around me.

“Dad?” I said trying to pull away. “Can we do this some other time – preferably when I’m wearing pants.”

“Yeah, this is a little weird.”

So with that – it was over. My mom and I kissed and made up, and my parents bought a new microwave. And we never spoke of it again. I know that this will not be the last time my mom dreams up some crazy scenario in her head. I can’t even imagine what the next one will be, and to be honest, I’m scared to even guess. But I know my dad is right. She does it out of love. And you know what they say about a mother’s love – it’s as permanent as the stench of burned taquitos.