In Montreal, I hadn’t lasted too long as a Pizza Delight Girl and after quitting, moved from one low-paying job to another. During this time, I was involved in a casual relationship with Michael, who was gainfully employed at a bank. Within a few months he was transferred to Halifax and on a whim, I quit my job and flew there to surprise him because I was bored, lonely, and had never been to the Maritime Provinces. The reception was lukewarm, but I stayed for a few weeks until he drove back to Montreal to spend Christmas with his family. When he dropped me off in front of my apartment building, he told me he didn’t want to see me anymore. Because my philosophy was to go with whatever unfolded, I accepted his edict with stoicism. I felt sad, but not devastated. Then I walked up the three flights to my front door. There was a notice nailed to it that the locks had been changed because the rent hadn’t been paid.
When I left for Halifax, I’d given the couple across the hall, the Trickers, my rent in cash to give to the landlord who came around at the first of the month. I knocked on their door to see what’d happened, but they wouldn’t open it, although I could hear them shushing each other. The big question now was, “What’s next?” I was broke, unemployed, and unattached. I didn’t have enough money to pay that overdue rent plus the one that’d be due in a week, so I went to my sister Viv’s, where my dog Guido was waiting for me.
Being the holidays, it would take a while to find a job and then another couple of months to save enough to get an apartment. I didn’t want to stay with Viv and Doug, and my parents never would’ve loaned me money, so I didn’t ask. My only option was to return home to Arlington in defeat where at least I could get a decent job.
My parents came up to Viv’s for Christmas and when I told my father that all my possessions were locked up in my apartment because the Trickers stole my rent money, he looked stricken and said, “I’ll take care of it.” I had no idea what he meant. However, early the next morning, I was astonished to find out that he had rented a small trailer. He woke me up with, “We’re going to your apartment.” On the way over, I asked, “How are you going to get in? My key doesn’t work.”
“You’ll see.”
When we were in front of my apartment door, my law-abiding, scared of authority father whipped out a small leather envelope which held a set of six lock picks in graduating sizes. Within seconds we were in the apartment. It didn’t take long to gather up the possessions I wanted, which we threw into the trailer and drove off quickly in the most unlikely getaway car—a powder blue Ford Falcon. Astounded by my father’s breaking the law for me and by not asking for me to pay for the trailer, I smiled thinking, all those cowboy movies must have brought out the vigilante in him.
“Dad, where did you learn how to do that?”
“It’s easy if you know how locks work.”
“But Dad, you broke the law.”
“Well, those people stole your money and that wasn’t right, goddamn sons of bitches.”
“Wow. Thanks, Dad.”
I didn’t care about the stuff I’d left in that apartment and never would’ve tried to retrieve it on my own. Watching my father do something so out of the ordinary with such confidence made moving back home in economic and personal defeat a little more palatable. Still, having no love interest nor anything to run from made me feel more adrift than usual.
I got a job in Arlington Center as the receptionist at Computer Accounting, one of the first electronic bookkeeping firms. The computers were the size of panel trucks and stored data from key-punched cards onto magnetic tape reels as large as tractor trailer steering wheels. The salesmen often lingered at the reception desk, making small talk, as though they were charming.
One had been handsome, but now had that puffy, tired look of a prisoner of the rat race—someone who was unhappy, who smoked and drank too much. At an office party, he put his hand on my behind like he owned it as he stood right next to his girlfriend, who happened to be my boss. I walked away, knowing it would’ve been inadvisable to complain. Although he made me the exact offer I got from Mr. Pizza Delight, this guy was a lot smoother, claiming he was asking for a friend, “What’s a beautiful girl like you doing answering phones? You could be having so much more fun. Wouldn’t you like your own apartment? And a car?” There must have been a script these guys memorized. I was totally broke, had no car, and was temporarily trapped in my own private Hell of defeat while living again with my parents. However, these circumstances were preferable to trading sex for a flashy lifestyle.
Because I’d been married and out on my own, the dynamic at home had changed. Basically, I rented my old bedroom, which had been remodeled in froufrou—every drawer, shelf, and inch of the closet filled with my mother’s clothes, every surface knick-knacked. I camped there among the pastel chiffon ruffles for a reasonable fee, living out of boxes until I saved enough for my own apartment. I came and went as I pleased, disclosing as little as possible, which made my mother uncomfortable. She surprised me though when she said, “I’m putting away the money you’re paying for rent so that someday, if you ever really need it, I can give it to you.”
“Wow, Mom, that’s really nice. Thank you.” I believed her.
Michael had changed his mind about me and invited me to Florida in late winter. This was a welcome break from being stuck at home with my parents. Shortly after my return, when I got home from going out to dinner with another guy, my mother remarked tersely about being ashamed of what the neighbors will think.
“Why?”
“Well, you just went to Florida with three men. Everyone saw you get out of that car. Now you’re with some other guy. How do you think that looks?”
“Who cares who saw me get out of the car? I’m not with some other guy. We just had dinner.”
“But you slept with him.”
“Why do you say that? I didn’t, by the way.”
“Because when a woman has sex outside of marriage once, she can never say no. She has to have it all the time.” My mother was harboring a Reefer Madness-like fantasy of her daughter as a crazed nymphomaniac.
“Whoa Mom, where did you ever get that?”
“My mother told me.”
“So, you think if a woman has had sex outside of marriage, then she loses control and has to have sex with every man she’s alone with?”
“That’s what I was taught.”
“No, Mom, it doesn’t work that way. You don’t lose your mind when you have unmarried sex.”
“You can do that, spend time with a man and not have sex with him?”
“Yes, Mom, I can do that,” (although, I rarely did).
Little did my mother know that her décor would’ve raised the neighbors’ eyebrows. I’d often retreat to the parlor to read because it was the farthest room away from the blasting TV in the den. After not having watched television for more than a year, the anxiety level in advertisers’ voices along with laugh tracks grated on me. The first time I entered the parlor I noticed a new statue on the piano amongst the bowling trophies and high school graduation photos. Ceramic, about eight inches tall, and cylindrical, it could have been considered an interpretation of a monk, but in fact was an erect penis. I howled when I saw it and called for my mother.
“Mom, where did you get this?” as I held it up to her face.
“Alvina made it for me in her ceramics class. It’s St. Peter. What’s so funny?”
By this time, I was laughing so hard I could barely speak, “Mom, does this remind of you anything?”
“What? It’s St. Peter.”
“It sure is, Mom,” as I moved it up and down suggestively.
My mother gasped.
“How long have you had that on the piano?” I guffawed.
“Oh no! I can’t believe Alvina would do that to me.” My poor mother too mortified to see the humor. She grabbed St. Peter out of my hand and ran to her bedroom to hide it.
Despite the risqué knickknack episode, I felt trapped in an endless loop of bickering in my childhood home. Thankfully, I was no longer my mother’s only target. She’d turned her sights on my father—the more silent he became, the louder she got. They were about to make a huge lifestyle change. Anxiety was high and I was not. Dreams of escape were once again part of my daily routine.
When I’d shown them the farm in La Patrie that Wolf and I wanted to buy—a five-bedroom farmhouse, barn, and over two-hundred acres with an asking price of $5,800—my father saw a chance for early retirement and bought the place. Their triple-decker was long paid for and had increased in value significantly. They planned to work as much overtime as possible for two years, quit their jobs, and move to Canada—a radical decision for people who had to have pork chops every Wednesday.
Fixing up a derelict farmhouse that’d been vacant for years was a dream come true for my father. My mother’s idea of a good time was bargain hunting in department stores and going to musicals on Broadway dressed to the nines, which she did every April with her two sisters and a friend. Moving to a farming community of 750 non-English speakers an hour’s drive on dirt roads to the nearest town, must’ve put her more on edge than she normally was.
Like a good wife, my mother pretended to be happy about leaving her perfect, pristine apartment on the bus line, the job at which she excelled, and her work colleagues who were her only social contacts. Their new house had been owned by dairy farmers who raised twenty-six children there. It’d been empty long enough for the ceiling in the living room to have collapsed and wild animals to have moved in. Renovating would be a huge undertaking, filthy and disruptive. My father would be focused on solving the big problems, while expecting to be cared for in the usual kid-glove manner. The daily logistics of maintaining his comfort and managing his sensitive digestion in a construction zone would be entirely my mother’s responsibility. Plus, she’d have to drop everything to hold the flashlight or fetch the wrench. As the atmosphere at home in Arlington became more tense, my need for a place of my own became more acute.
Coming on October 1!
Chapter 35: Anger, Fear, & Longing returns to adulthood where reflection empowers, responsibility is taken, and help is found.