Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.
It sounds like someone was trying to break into our apartment by knocking on our door approximately 3,000 times in a ten second span. I was in our living room on our couch doing my impression of a fat, tired man laying on a couch - performing the part well actually - having just gotten a very cranky Sienna off to sleep. Danielle looked up our kitchen table where she was enjoying her Sunday ritual of "squeezing in the reading of the New York Times when I get a chance."
"Stop that!" I yelled it as I moved from the couch toward the living room door. It wasn't a particularly deranged knocking of the door - if you have ever seen Sheldon on The Big Bang Theory knock on his neighbors door you'll get the idea - and I was mostly concerned that the fool pounded would wake up my child.
However I'm not an idiot either. I looked through the peep hole.
There was a young 20-something in a tuxedo standing at my doorway. In the grand scheme of life looked like someone had tied four twigs together, glued four cotton balls to his head and called it a human being. I shall call him Stick Boy at this point.
I whipped open the door and he was rather surprised to see, well, ME. "What the hell are you doing?"
Stick Boy took a step backward and immediately raised his hands into a mea-culpa. "I'msosorry. I thoughtthiswasmyfriendsapartment.YoumustthinkI'manidiot. I'msorry."
I looked down onto the street and I was a few of Stick Boy's friends by an SUV. One guy, two women, and all of them dressed for some sort of social event.
"What are you doing?" Stick Boy's male friend yelled up. Concerned over what his buddy had seemingly gotten himself into.
"I thought this was your apartment!" Stick Boy yelled back. "I'manidiot," Stick Boy repeated. Backing further away.
"Yes, you are," I said.
Stick Boy stepped through our open outside door - we have two sets of doors, I still have no idea how he got through the first set.
"My daughter is asleep, if you woke her up..." I left it trail off as Stick Boy made his way through the door. I shut it behind him, locked it, and listened as his friend dressed him down for being a moron.
Once inside Danielle and I got to talking about random New York run ins with apartments. Stick Boy isn't even the top five. Living in New York you just run into weird stuff living in apartments, or involved with apartments.
Here are the rest.
The Avatar People
Danielle and I agreed on the price for our Butler Street apartment as had one last meeting left: meet the landlords. Really, a perfunctory moment designed to make sure everyone isn't crazy. As we sat in the real estate office on Smith Street across from our landlords and the real estate agent (who was licking his lips at the check HE was about to receive) about to put pen onto paper...two people on stilts dressed as the blue creatures from avatar appeared.
They pressed their hands and faces to the window of the real estate office and bellowed, "Don't sign the lease! Don't sign."
We still signed. No alien creatures were keeping us from a good piece of real estate.
The Kiddie Pool
I lived in on the sixth floor of a six floor in the East Village during the late 90s. It was a two bedroom apartment and legendary among my friends for its lack of cleanliness.
One fine miserably hot summer evening I was awoken at 2 AM by some loud crashed above my living room. As plaster fell around me I was concerned that there was (a) a possible murder taking place and (b) I was going to get no sleep.
I threw on some shorts, a t-shirt, grabbed my cellphone, headed to the roof, whipped open the metal doorway going to the roof. I would like to pause the story here to point out that this is the type of behavior you do in your 20s - walking to a roof where a crime might be taking place - yeah, I would rethink that (literally) when I reached my 30s.
Story onward.
I whipped open the metal doorway and saw two young men in their early 20s dressed only in tightie whitey underwear jumping up-and-down in a kiddie pool.
"Hey!" I have no idea why I yelled. Probably the lesser known of the fight-flight-scream in shock reaction.
"Hey man!" one of them yelled.
"You guys are caving in my living room!" Like alcohol being consumed, pure shock leads to the truth.
"Sorry about that," the second guy said, "it's hot and we needed to unwind." He took a cigarette out of -- I don't even know where that cigarette came from -- and lit it.
"It's all good. Just stop jumping."
"Thanks. Hey, you want to join us?" The question came from guy number one.
There are many things I will attest to having tried in my life. Frollicking around on an East Village roof in a kiddie pool with two men in their tightie whities is not one of them.
The Dog
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Once again I was concerned about my East Village roof caving in as something was taking place. Once again I went to investigate.
As I opened the metal door I was nearly run over by a dog. Forty pounds of muscle, sinew, and hanging tongue coming straight for me. The dog got to within inches from me and with the grace of gazelle performed a hairpin turn while scooping up a tennis ball - that I certainly had not seen - with its sharp-I-can-eat-you teeth.
Across the roof was my neighbor Jason.
"Sorry about that," Jason said as the dog sprinted back to him, dropped the ball, and headed back out for another pass. "He is a stray and we took him home. We don't have a leash though and he needed some exercise. Did his running disturb you?"
Just a bit Jason. Just a bit.
(Quick add on. Scudder had a habit of walking out of the apartment when I would get home. Jason and his wife's apartment were adjacent to mine. One day as Scudder stepped out Jason's door open, Scudder stepped toward Jason's apartment and found himself nose-to-nose with the dog. Scudder never tried to sneak out again).
Say Nothing
When I lived in Cheever Placer in Brooklyn, once again a legendary apartment due to its tilt. Not a slight tilt either, I could sit in a corner of my living room, roll a ball at an angle and it would come back to me in seconds.
A married couple lived in a building - he an ex-con and she a rather violent probably heading for jail at some point in her life. They were very nice people though, except for when they fought. Terrible. Loud. Violent fights. The police were called several times by the ex-con's mother (who also lived in the building.)
One night I was coming home and heard them screaming at the top of their lungs. They were on the 2nd floor and I was on the 4th floor of the walkup and as I headed up the stairs I came to the unfortunate conclusion that their door was open.
The two of them were in the doorway, in plain sight, slapping away at each and that is when they saw me. Everyone stopped and stared at each other. The fight-flight-scream in shock instinct gained another new level of "say nothing."
The ex-con turned to his girlfriend and said, "Well now EVERYONE in the apartment knows how stupid you are!" He then slammed the door.
I continued on to my apartment. Really, what would you have done?
Yeah, living in New York - and anywhere really, I once opened the front door to the house in Framingham naked because religious people were bothering me - always has an adventure or two. Random run ins with apartments.
I am sure Sienna will come up with her own stories and adventures.
Wayne
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