My Own Private Ida-Hell

My Escape from Apartment 196

I'd really like to know 'WTF'?! Not 3 minutes go by that I finally get the plastic reclining chair arranged by the community pool on a mild winter's day, then it goes from peaceful and silent to filled with cacophonous noises. It's like I have a prisoner's anklet on that lets the complex know that I'm outside and (un)ready to be pestered.

People start making nonsensical noises in an upper apartment. Do I live on a Tourette's ward? Someone comes out with country music blasting while their cigarette smoke naturally wafts over in my direction. I hear what I think are more Tourette's-stricken grunts at the complex door entrance. After a few salvos, I peer over and see some guy. I guess someone has to let him in, but guess what. It ain't me! If he lives here, he should have a key; there is a phone box if a friend or delivery person shows up; and I'm dozens of yards away behind a locked pool gate. I'm wondering if he has a pair of binoculars to see me in the first place.

I don't hear grunts anymore and I speculate that he may have gone away. I'm not curious enough to look in case that initiates the grunting again.

More country music...God, more guttural pleas to be let in...I could have sworn I heard the sound of a cane. The cane only means one thing: Dadzilla is nearby. I look out of the corner of my eye. Nope, not him. Not sure who just went around the corner.

Oh, good. The noisy jackass that lives right above me. His room that he shares with his wife and small daughter is right above mine. He's hocking up loogies. Pleasant, but typical.

The older guy from an upstairs apartment has finally finished his cigarette after about ten minutes. I looked up to see him once. He was pretty quiet, so it wasn't an inconvenience. I just kept feeling him staring at me.

Mr. Country Music has left his door open, as if he's providing the marquee entertainment this evening. Sorry, sir. I didn't buy a ticket for this show.

I hear the spinning of a dryer in the laundry room. I find comfort in non-human induced sounds. It is white noise. It's something I prefer hearing with its mechanical monotonous tone..

Now, there's a lady with a preschooler. This lady fancies herself a singer, but I can't make out the language.

I have to ponder the irony of it all. I came out to what I saw as a quiet, peaceful place. I should have known that any place remotely public would eventually come alive.

There are the lengths one is willing to go when escape from Dadzilla and sanity is at stake. I initially came out here because he came inside, whistling all the way.

This is why it's all too probable that I will never have peace until I'm once again away on my own.

<Dadzilla Cried Wolf>                                            <cont'd in future post>