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My Paparazzi

Occasionally random people decide they must have a picture of me. It feels like I am being followed by paparazzi.  They appear out of nowhere with their phones, sometimes hiding behind poles, sometimes blatantly flashing in my face.  I assume they need the photos to show their friends, because I am not famous (yet.)  I don’t understand the compulsion to take pictures of me getting toilet paper at Walgreens or looking haggard on the subway.  But as my mother always says, there is no accounting for taste.
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The Other One

I share my body with another person.  Well, she’s actually a monster that takes control in the morning.  My parents met her when I started pre-school.   Morning always began with one of them standing beside the bed calling my name sweetly “Cara, Cara, Cara time to get up.”  When I didn’t move, they added a gentle shoulder tap to their effort.  I still didn’t budge, so they resorted to mild shaking.  Eventually, the shaking worked and the monster woke, crying wildly.  My poor parents tried to have a rational discussion with me, but I was asleep and the monster was incapable of being rational.  After a considerable period of the monster’s hysterics, my parents gave up and dressed me while I was lying down.

In grade school, the monster adapted and turned the morning routine into a game, a competition if you will. Her strategy was to stay quiet and hit the snooze button as fast as she could. The hope was they’d forget about us.  Judi and Sid (my parents) never did.

My dad started the game every morning with a wake up call.

Dad: Cara it’s time to get up.
Monster: Uh Huh
Dad: The next time I pass by your room, you better be moving.
Monster: Uh Huh
Dad: I’m serious, the next time I pass by your room, I better hear some movement or you are in trouble.

The monster saw my father’s ultimatum as a challenge and responded with the “Fake Out” (Sit up in bed while my dad passed and then immediately lie back down.)

Enter my Mom, signaling the counting portion of the competition.  Judi is known for having her share of issues with the morning.  So, while she rushed frantically to dress herself, she screamed numbers across the hall as forceful encouragement.

Mom: Cara you have until three to get out of that bed. One….Two…Three. Get Up, Are you Up?
Monster: “Uh huh, I’m up , I’m Up.” (I wasn’t up.)
Mom: I don’t hear any feet on the ground.
Monster: I’m getting dressed on my bed.

Time Out:
My parents had a short strategy session in their bedroom.  This bought me and the monster another minute of uninterrupted sleep.

Mom: I don’t think she’s up.
Dad: Of course she’s not up. I’m going in there!!! (The final escalation)

My father stormed across the hall yelling threats.

Dad: I’m coming in there!!!! You better be up or else you are in deep trouble!!!!
Monster: Zzzzzzzzzzzzz (The monster held her ground and laid there motionless.)

Angered by the lump in the shape of his daughter, my dad ripped off the covers and forced the window shades to the ceiling.  While the shades were flying up, the monster pulled the covers back over our head. When my father turned around and saw the monster unmoved by his dramatic play, he flew into a no holds barred freak out, yelling threats at the top of his lungs.   The threats quickly turned to full grounding; life would be limited to school, homework and reading.  Realizing she had been defeated, the monster dressed us as fast as a lump could. (It was like watching paint dry, but at least we were vertical.)  This was our morning routine through high school.

In college the monster adapted again and was now a foul-mouthed old man.  On our own, I, not the monster, was responsible for getting us up.  She got up begrudgingly, although there were times she forced us to skip morning classes.  All my friends and roommates knew it was best not to acknowledge me until couple hours after we got up. They were never quite sure what would come out of my mouth.

After college, my friend Reuben and I lived together.  He too, has a morning monster. But, our monsters had an understanding that talking was not permitted before work. Grunting was our sole communication tool. As a result, our monsters co-existed for three years, with only a few minor conflicts.

I live alone now and that’s probably best for everyone.  After all these years, the monster has not changed, so I guess this is it.  I am tied to her for the rest of my life.

A couple of days ago, an unlucky woman had the misfortune of meeting the monster.  We were walking down the subway steps as the woman was walking up.  She stopped and stared when she saw us. Since the monster is not visible, I can only guess she was staring because of my height.  The woman began to point and laugh.  Monster, who was still in control of all my major functions, turned to her and said “@*$& @#$%$ @#%$@# you bad wig wearin #*&!##$.”  The woman was stunned into silence and frankly so was I.  But, the train was pulling into the station, so I had no time to apologize for the monster’s outburst. We quickly ran down the rest of the steps, leaving the woman to pick her bottom lip off the ground.

If you encounter us in the morning, please remember, I am not in control, she is.

Space Invaders

I don’t understand close talkers.  The ones who get so close to your face, you can see their tonsils and smell their breakfast.  Due to my height, many people believe it is a requirement to get right in my face to hold a conversation. (Is there a manual out there being passed around entitled “How to talk to little people?” If this is the advice being disseminated by said book, all copies must be thrown out.) There are three types of close talkers, the leaners, the kneelers and the chairs.

The leaners, get right in my face to start a conversation. Many of them double over and put their hands on my shoulders.    I must first state, I am an extreme germaphobe.  When strangers and known dirty people get too close, the leaning over touching thing sends me into code red . If you have known me for any length of time you can recognize the signs. My face and body tighten up.  My lips get stuck in a pursed smile.  Meanwhile, my brain has shut down and there is a ticker tape in my head repeating “Why are you so close?, Why are you breathing on me? Have you washed your hands lately? Did you just try to hug me? Back Up!!!! Back Up!!!!”

It’s a scientific fact that sound travels, we don’t have to be so close.  But you can’t tell the kneelers that.  This close talker group believes it’s appropriate to kneel in bars to speak to me.  They always say, “I want to look you in the eye,” as they get down on their knees.  Some of them attempt to hug me while they’re down there.  Thru my pursed lips, I ask them to please get up off the ground, because  A. They are blocking the bar.  B. Everyone is staring.  C. No one is really tall enough that I can’t see their eyes if standing.  Somehow the kneelers never hear my pleas, despite being right up in my grill.

But, my absolute favorite close talkers, are the ones who ask me stand on a chair. Again, so we can look each other in the eye. (There are a lot of people in the world, hung up on direct eye contact.)  My reply is always, “I can see your eyes from down here, just tip your head a little to the south and I’ll tip mine a little to the north.”  Some of them try to insist, by grabbing a chair and patting the seat.  I refuse and they insist, until I excuse myself to “use the restroom.”  Honestly, I am not that interested in the conversation that I’d hold it standing on a chair.  Would you stand on a chair if you were talking to Yao Ming? Would you feel like a fool if you did? Because, you sure would look like one.

Despite the close talkers, most of the time I go about my day like everyone else until some genius asks me to stand on a chair.

Bed Stuy: The Seamstress

Recently, I have had a couple of strange encounters that makes me think I may not be the only black, female, little person with a red afro in Bed Stuy.

The other night, I got off the subway and headed towards the corner grocery store.  As I  approached the store, I heard this woman frantically screaming.  This being a fairly common occurrence in Bed Stuy, I didn’t turn around right away.  But this woman just kept screaming “Miss, Miss.” “Excuse Me!!!”  Um Hellooo..Miss.”  When I finally turned around to see the crazy lady, she was right behind me and out of breath.  I realized I was the “Miss” and I had never seen this woman before in my life.  I said “Hi” and then she said, “My daughter is graduating from High School and I need a seamstress.”  My face must have said “Huh?” Cause she asked, “Aren’t you the seamstress?”  I said, “No, sorry.”  My response didn’t seem to faze her, because she continued. “I need someone to make an outfit for my daughter, we didn’t realize she was going to graduate until today. We only have two weeks.” It seemed she was under the delusion, if she pled her case well, I might agree to be her seamstress. (Like I was lying about my identity and just refusing to take her business.)  I said, “No, I’m sorry that’s not me.”  Then she said,  “I should have kept her number.  Well, I thought it was you.” Then she muttered under her breath, “There must be another one, I need the other one.”

Two days later, I ran into my elderly neighbor (persistent suitor) on my way to the subway.    He asked, “Can I drive you to work?”  I said “Oh, No Thank You.” (exaggerating how thankful I was.)  Then he said, “I have a car, I can drive you.”  “You wouldn’t have to pay for a cab.”  I said “No thanks, I’m fine, I take the subway to work.”  Then he said, “You have that store over on Fulton, it’s a quick ride.”  I said, “No, I work in the city.”  “Oh, someone told me you had  a tailoring store over on Fulton.”  “Nope, that’s not me.”

Hmmm……… Me thinks we may have another Pam situation on our hands.

Holiday Travel

I woke up early today to prepare for my annual trip to St. Louis (Home.) Because I am a chronic procrastinator, I had not packed a stitch of clothing three hours before my plane was to depart. I am pretty adept at packing quickly, which really means I pack everything I own.  My suitcase is the size of a dresser. Anyway, I called a car and dragged my enormous bag downstairs, along with a hiking backpack and my purse. (Told you, I packed everything.) The car arrived while I was still struggling with my bags and trying to lock the front door. The driver parked, sat in the car and stared.  I said to myself “Well, I guess he’s not getting out, I hope he reminds me to do something nice for him.” When I started down the front steps, the driver’s face turned to panic.  He opened the car door and slowly got out. As he headed for the front steps, I quickly realized he was a stroke victim (I am a jerk.)  He stumbled up the steps to help me, while I said, “Oh no, don’t worry about it,” but his male pride took over and he dragged my bag down the outside steps and threw it into the trunk. (It’s now confirmed, I am a jerk.)  When I got into the car he said, “Uh, where  you, uh going.” And now I realize he doesn’t speak English and my Spanish is rusty at best.  So we found a strange way to communicate through my broken Spanish and his broken English and we got to Laguardia on time. I tipped him really well, to make up for my jerky thoughts.

When I got into the terminal, the security line was so long and dense I couldn’t see the ticket counters. It zig zagged through the entire front ticket area and looked to be at least an hour-long. I get really itchy in lines and this experience was no exception.  I started to pick out people from the line that I hoped were not on my plane.  There was an old lady in a bad wig, dragging a small dog carrier by the shoulder strap. The dog was perched on top of the carrier like he was riding on a sled.  She stopped to ask a question of the Indian American TSA agent managing the line.  As the TSA agent began to answer, the old lady cut her off and said “Well you aren’t from here, you don’t speak English, never mind.  I thought, here’s hoping that “bag” won’t be on my plane. Then there was the French family who spent their time screaming at each other.  Although, screaming in French is prettier than in English, it’s still screaming.  The father was also on his cell phone during most of this.  Sometimes he would pull the phone away from his ear, add his two cents to the argument and then resume his phone conversation.  When he got to the screener, he did the most reasonable thing, I have seen anyone do. He stood, blocked the line and continued his cell phone conversation for about ten minutes. I didn’t want them on my plane either, but because they were French I figured I was pretty safe they wouldn’t be. I finally got out of the security line with time to spare. So, I headed down to my gate, which turned out to be a door to the tarmac. You know the ones, where you board a bus to get to your plane. These are the worst gates, because they are usually boarding eight planes, that are all leaving within five minutes of each other, from one door.

There were hoards of people standing around, frantic, frustrated and confused.  Everyone was crowded around the desk, poised and ready to run as soon as their plane was called.  As I was standing around, I noticed this Yuppy couple with a toddler. The mother was running around with her toddler strapped to her in a Baby Bjorn yelling at her husband to, “Get the toy, get the toy, get the toy!!!” The husband was on the floor digging through the diaper bag frantically trying to follow his wife’s directions with no success. His wife finally rushed over and reached down and snatched the toy out of the bag. The child seemed to be completely unfazed, although the mother was acting like it was the kid causing the drama.  I prayed they wouldn’t be on my plane.

The agents finally called pre-boarding for my flight and I did what I never do. I took the out, used my height and pre-boarded. It was wrong, I fully admit it, but I couldn’t deal any more. Once on the plane, I felt a little more relaxed.  The flight attendants had Christmas carols playing over the speaker and I settled into my seat, but the solace was not to last.  The old lady with the dog appeared and sat across the aisle one row ahead of me. About five minutes later, the Yuppy couple appeared on the plane.  The mother and toddler sat in first class, which was only three rows ahead of me. The father was in coach. (He seemed relieved.) This was going to be a long two hours for the rest of us in the front of the plane.

The drama started early, when this other couple arrived and stood next to the row where the Crazy Dog Lady was sitting. The man said, “Excuse me ma’am but you are in one of our seats.”  Crazy Dog Lady responded with, “No, no this is my seat.” He said, “Well, we don’t really care if you sit there, but we have to have two seats, where is your seat?”  Her response was, “No this is my seat sorry.”  The couple sat down in the row in front of me, I guess deciding that it wasn’t worth the fight. But, then the owners of those seats arrived and they had to get up.  Long story short, the ground crew was called and they asked the “CDL” to get up, which then started an argument.  The crew woman kept asking the Crazy Dog Lady for her boarding pass which she of course didn’t have, so the ticket desk was called and it turns out she was supposed to be in the row in front of where she was.  Everyone sat down in their respective seats and things seemed calm down again.  That is, until we backed away from the gate and Yuppy Mommy stood up and started frantically rocking her baby and pacing up and down the aisle.  The flight attendant got on the loud speaker and said, “Please sit down, we can’t leave until everyone is sitting down.” Yuppy Mommy obliged, but not before rolling her eyes and taking a deep breath. We finally took off twenty minutes late, but at least we were in the air. Things seemed like they were going to be calm. There were no babies crying, the crazy dog lady’s meds seemed to have kicked in and Yuppy Mommy seemed to have mellowed out.

But wait, I spoke too soon. The captain turned the seat belt sign off and as if on cue, Yuppy Mommy jumped up from her seat and started bouncing the baby up and down the aisle. She went into the flight attendant area and stood in their way. Then she started dancing with the baby down the coach aisle, shoving her child’s feet into everyone’s face. (The Baby was not moving. She showed no signs of being awake.) The flight attendants had to walk around her to serve drinks.  A couple of times the attendants said, “Excuse me,” but YM acted perturbed like the attendants were in “Her” way.  I prayed for sleep, but it didn’t come.  It couldn’t, the guy next to me was elbowing me in the side every time he turned the page of his newspaper. This seemed to be the longest two hours of my life. If I wasn’t being assaulted by YM and her Baby Bjorn, I was being elbowed in the gut by the guy next to me. The eleventh time the guy elbowed me, I groaned and he stopped.

Back to Yuppy Mommy. She had to be told several more times to sit down, including during landing.  She spotted Crazy Dog Lady and decided that her child had asked to pet the dog. (The baby had not asked to pet the dog.  She hadn’t even seen it, she was asleep.) The flight attendants had enough and walked up to “YM” and asked her to please sit in her seat, so we could land.  She finally did, but only begrudgingly.  When we finally landed, I jumped out of my seat as soon as I possibly could and ran out of the plane to freedom.  I may have left stuff behind, but my freedom was more important.  I have never been so happy to see an airport terminal.  Freedom Sweet Freedom!!!

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah!!

Philadelphia: The Swarm

Several months after I moved to Philly, Reuben and I were able to rent an apartment.  We both had been living with his parents, until I could find a job. It was early December when we moved in. We spent the next few weeks trying to furnish our apartment and buy Christmas presents on our meager salaries. He suggested Wal-Mart.  I had never actually been in a Wal-Mart. I only shopped at Target. I’m kinda high-end.  Nevertheless, I acquiesced, because my wallet said Wal-Mart, even though my heart was at Target.

I was a little overwhelmed by the size of Wal-Mart.  The store was so large. We got a cart and started wandering through the aisles picking up household items and arguing about space and necessity. Reuben had a penchant for things featuring Bette Davis and I had one for toilet paper and throw pillows. Don’t Ask!  We decided to split up for a while to cool off and feed our addictions, without the other’s intervention.  I headed towards the throw pillows and that’s when things got interesting.  I was looking at some amazing floor pillows, trying to figure out how I could get them past Reuben, when a band of kids of varying ages passed by.  They were all a little unkempt. One of the smaller children had a kool-aid stain around his mouth and another had snot running down her face. The older kids clothes were visibly dirty and their hair was uncombed. They were screaming, laughing and tearing it up in the Wal-Mart at midnight. They were also completely unsupervised. As they were passing, one the of the older boys (he looked about 10) spotted me, stopped and called to his fellow ragamuffins to come look.

Let the games begin.

They stood at the end of the aisle and stared, I focused my gaze on the shelf.  After about a minute, I had enough, so I turned my head and stared back. They were startled that I was aware of them, so they ran. This was not to be the end of our encounter, instead they decided to stalk me. They were quick, agile and organized tracking me from aisle to aisle. Their strategy was to stay at the end of the aisle and peer around the shelves giggling and pointing.  When it looked like I was going to change aisles they ran several ahead and watched to see where I was going.  Their precision at tracking was pretty good, so I decided to play along. I faked them out a couple of times by making like I was going to change aisles and then I didn’t. That didn’t fool them. They gave me about a minute and when I didn’t move, they ran back to their original positions. During one of my fake-outs, one of the swarm faltered. The oldest girl got a little too excited and ran into me. After that tactical error, they regrouped and decided to split in half. Now they were positioned at both ends of the aisle. When one of them wanted to take a closer look, they walked quickly down the aisle, staring at me with the side-eye. The rest of the swarm, remained at the ends waiting for their turn. (Kinda of like a Soul Train Line.)  During the oldest girl’s next turn down the aisle, she decided to break with tradition and stood in front of me doing Rockette kicks. Her big finish was to circle me doing a jazz hand shimmy. The Swarm was in hysterics, I just stared blankly. I really wanted to laugh, but that would break the fourth wall. I have never seen a band of children work together in such unison. They were as organized as a paramilitary regiment. They kinda looked like the children of militia members.

The game had been going on for least twenty minutes, when I finally met Reuben in the bedding section. I was carrying a giant throw pillow, which immediately started an argument. Reuben was never and will never be pro throw pillow. I didn’t mention the swarm, although they were still in hot pursuit.  When they followed us to the next aisle, Reuben realized what was happening.  He asked, “Has this been happening the whole time?” and I answered “Yes, don’t worry about it.”   They followed us to one more aisle and Reuben had, had enough. He announced “That’s It” and then marched over to the swarm and clapped at them, like animals.  Their faces went from joy to shock.  They weren’t prepared to be addressed directly, so they just stood there with an “Oh Sh@t” look.  Then Reuben yelled in his deepest guttural voice “Get out of here!!” They spread like buckshot.  Reuben followed them part way down the aisle clapping at them as they scurried off.  I died laughing right there in the Wal Mart.  Reuben walked back and said “Crap, that was annoying.”    To which I replied, “See, If we had gone to Target, this wouldn’t have happened.”

Philadelphia: Misfits and Wiccans pt 2

The first day of the rest of my life, started pretty uneventfully. The dress code was casual at best, so I didn’t have to bother with ironing.   I dressed in fifteen minutes and was out the door within a half an hour. When I got to the “office,” everyone was already there.  The Misfits were a lot mellower this morning. (Hung Over) Tracy was lying across the top of the sofa.  She opened her eyes and waved when I walked in.  Rich and Dan were both sleeping, sitting on the floor with their backs against the wall. Toothless was sitting at the receptionist desk, but she didn’t acknowledge me. I was fine with that, because she was still cursing under her breath.  I didn’t see Tara, so I sat down on the couch in front of Tracy and waited.

Tara appeared at one of the back doors about five minutes later.  She waved me over and I followed her through to the poster storeroom.  The towers of posters were so tall, I couldn’t see over them.  Tara walked me through the entire selection of posters. She said “Every morning we take at least twelve and sometimes up to twenty with us.” Tara sold two the day before, which apparently is a great day. I helped her pick out replacements and then we loaded her car.  John came into the room and screamed “Morning Meeting.” I followed Tara into yet another garage, which turned out to be the old dude’s office.  The room was pretty bare except for a desk in the corner and the only light came from the top windows of the garage door. The rest of the windows were covered in brown butcher paper.

I had never been to a business meeting so I wondered if we were going to talk about sales projections, territory and competitors. (I had no idea what any of that meant, but I heard it on TV.)  Turns out, the morning meeting was more of a pep rally.  We stood in a circle holding hands and John started the meeting by leading us in a prayer of sales.  After a moment of silence, he started clapping vigorously. Everyone else followed suit. The clapping was followed by yelling; Hey, Hey, Ho, Ho and then a weird sales chant.  Suddenly, everyone (including me) started running in a circle yelling and waving their hands about.  I bet you’re wondering, why I didn’t run for the nearest exit.  The problem is I went to theatre school, where improv games are a rule not an exception.  I just assumed they borrowed the techniques to better their salesmanship. (I had never been to a sales meeting, anything seemed plausible.)

Once everyone was properly pumped, we disbanded and headed to our cars.  Tara and I got into hers and drove away from the city.  We smoked and rode around for ages, traveling deeper and deeper into the Pennsylvania countryside.  Def Leppard and Fleetwood Mac was the soundtrack of the day.  Tara and I sang at the top of our lungs with the windows open and our hair blowing in the wind.  I felt like I was on a road trip. Finally, Tara said she knew of a spot that hadn’t been tapped yet. She made a U-turn on a police turnaround and drove back two exits. Once off the highway, we drove down an industrial road for a couple of minutes until we came to an office building.  Tara pulled into the garage, we got out and she grabbed two posters from her trunk.  We walked into the building and suddenly Tara seemed nervous and a little lost at what to do next. (At this point, it finally clicked that something was off.) She studied the building directory for a few minutes and then pointed at the name of an accounting company.  We took the stairs to the second floor and walked directly into the office without knocking.  The whole room was filled with white, middle-aged, grey haired women, who turned in unison and stared at us.  My face started to burn with shame and embarrassment. It felt like we had walked into someone’s home uninvited.  Tara nervously said “Would anyone like to buy some art?” The oldest of the women came to the door and asked us to leave.  Tara said “Sure” and we walked out of the room and then ran out of the building.  As we were running,  I started to question my participation with the company. Tara didn’t seem all that comfortable with her participation either, but neither of us expressed it, we just ran.

As we were loading the posters back into the trunk, two women from the office appeared across the garage with wallets in hand.  They called to us and asked to see our selection. In the end, Tara sold two posters.   She turned to me after the ladies left and said  “See, that was a great sale.” (I think she was trying to convince herself.) We drove around the rest of the day singing and talking.  We both really liked Tusk by Fleetwood Mac, so we played it at least twenty times that day.

At 3:30, we went back to the “office.”  Toothless was still at the front desk when we arrived.  Tara and I sat down on the couch and Toothless struck up a conversation about a lingerie catalog, she was thumbing through.   Then she started regaling us with her and John’s sexual escapades from the night before.  Apparently, she had dressed in a french maid’s uniform and you can fill in the blanks, but I will say there was a lot of laughing and grunting noises made during the telling of the story.  I sat quietly with a strange smile pasted on my face, hoping they wouldn’t notice how uncomfortable I was. John came out and asked Tara to come to his office.  She whispered to me, that she was going to give me a glowing report.   About five minutes later, John called me in.  I wasn’t sure what I was going to say to him.  He asked if I would like to continue and I said “Yes.” (Still can’t explain why I didn’t take the out.)  I have a problem with follow thru, sometimes I follow thru to a fault.  John said “Great, come back tomorrow same time and you’ll go out on your own.”  I knew I wasn’t ready for that, but my pride would not allow me to say so.  I drove back to Sarina’s with a pit in my stomach knowing I would have to go back there tomorrow.

When I got home, Sarina quizzed me about how it was.  I said “Great,” leaving out all of the details.  I spent the whole night tossing and turning in bed.  I just kept asking myself “How in the world am I going to sell posters out of my car?”

I was exhausted the next morning, but I got up early and drove back to the “office.” Tara greeted me with a big smile and Rich came over and said “I’m going to help you set up your car. Can you pull it around to the back?”  Rich turns out was a really nice guy. He got in my car and put my back seats down and then lined my trunk with a box.  We walked around the storeroom together and picked out some posters.  He told me which ones sell the best and then he loaded them up, just in time for the morning meeting.   The meeting was the same as the morning before, lots of yelling and clapping. (I was hoping the meeting would never end, but it did.)  The moment finally came for me to go out on my own and sell posters to unsuspecting normal people.  I was so scared.

I got in my car and drove around for about an hour, until I worked up enough courage to get out and try.  I stopped at a dentist’s office, walked in with my samples and the receptionist gave me a puzzled look.  I asked her if the office had any interest in new art work.  She said “I don’t handle that.”  Then the dentist appeared behind her and said “Sorry, I collect art and spend a lot of time and money investing in original art work. I wouldn’t put cheap reproductions in here.”  I said, “Sure, your art is really nice, thanks.”   I slunked out of the office completely embarrassed.  I drove around for another hour, until I made the decision to go back to Sarina’s.  I just couldn’t do it. So, I parked the car in the garage, sat on the couch and watched TV for the rest of the day.  I called Reuben at work. (We didn’t have cell phones yet, so it was a dead giveaway I wasn’t selling.) He said “Where are you? Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”  I said “Oh, I’m quitting, I couldn’t do it.”  He response was “It’s only Noon.”  I said “Uh-huh, that’s all I could handle.”  He laughed and said “Why don’t you come over for dinner after work.”  I said “Ok.”

I drove back to the office and everyone was so excited to see me.  Rich asked “How did you do?” I said “Oh, I didn’t sell anything.”  Tara said “That’s ok, it’s only your first day.”  John said “We should keep the posters in your car, so you don’t have to load up tomorrow.”  I knew I wasn’t coming back the next day, so I said “I’m not sure they will be safe because I park my car on the street in Center City. Can I leave them here?”  John said “Sure, we’ll leave them in a pile, out-of-the-way.”  I left the office, but not before I told everybody that I would see them tomorrow. (I didn’t want to hurt their feelings.)

Around midnight, I called the office and quit via the answering machine, citing a family emergency.  That call ended all contact with the poster cult, but I still wonder what happened to everybody, especially Tara.  I sort of felt like I abandoned her, but it’s every man for themselves.   To this day every time I hear Tusk by Fleetwood Mac, I think of my time with the Poster cult.

Bed Stuy Indian

Bed Stuy, Brooklyn has been my home for the past two years.  It’s no longer the place that people fear.  The old neighbors that remain are amazing and the new neighbors are trying to keep the feeling of the neighborhood.  There are still drug dealers and a couple of crack whores, but by and large, it’s really a great neighborhood. The violence of before is on the decline, but some of the amazing characters have remained.

The first morning I walked to the subway, I met my friend Indian. (The neighbors call him Indian. I have no idea what his given name is.)  He’s approximately 6 foot 3 and ethnically east Indian with a Caribbean accent.  I think he’s Jamaican, but I can’t be too sure.  He’s always intoxicated, no matter what time of day.  So most of the time I can’t tell what he’s saying.  He wears hip hop clothes and is probably in his 50’s or 60’s.  I don’t know where he lives, but I know where to find him or rather he knows where to find me.  That first morning, he came running out from one of the covered porches and gave me a huge hug and kiss and said “Respect mon.”  Then he said some other stuff that was unintelligible.

At night he used to hang out with the drug dealers and was usually so drunk he could barely stand up.  The dealers tried to get him to stop hugging me.  One time, one of the dealers put himself between the two of us and said “Man, she doesn’t want you to touch her.”  He didn’t listen and went right back to hugging me the next day.  Indian has changed sides of the street and currently hangs out with the old men who drink and play cards. He still runs over to greet me with a hug.

Over the past two years Indian has danced at me, sung to me and given me advice (I’m still working on translating the advice. When I figure it out, I’ll let you know.)  Once he led me into the new neighborhood restaurant and then walked out.  I was standing in the restaurant by myself with the staff staring at me like, “What do you want?”  I told them that Indian just grabbed me off the street and led me in.  They gave a knowing look and laughed.   Sometimes he waves me over to tell me something important. I have never understood anything he has said, but I have grown to really like Indian. I know I’m home when he greets me.   It’s become a thing.

The Top Ten

Most Ridiculous Reactions to My Height

1. Patting me on the head (You don’t ever touch a black woman’s hair – EVER. There are men married to black women who have never touched their wives hair.)

2. Stopping, staring and then saying out loud “There’s a midget!.” Then smiling and saying “Hello”- (At that point I know you have been talking about me – I’m not deaf and you aren’t whispering.)

3. Starting a fake conversation by calling me someone else’s name, just so you can hear me speak.  (Sometimes I go along with it and ask some random question like “Wasn’t that a fantastic reunion last week?”)

4. Getting angry if I don’t want to stop and talk (I would suggest yoga, it calms the mind and you seem to have an anger management problem.)

5. Asking me how old I am? (Really, I shouldn’t even have to comment on this one.)

6. Asking me how tall I am (Anyone who has passed the second grade should be able to guess.)

7. Asking me if I can get you free tickets to the circus (Am I wearing a clown costume?)

8. Asking me if I am capable of having children. (No, apparently they ‘ve left that up to stupid people.)

9. Asking me how I have sex, “Is it regular?”  (If you have to ask  “Don Juan” then you don’t know what you are doing and I am not interested.)

10. Asking me to take a picture with you. (Unless I am commanding a 7 figure salary, I don’t do that.)

Bonus

11. Wow, you are really short! (WHAT?!!! I’d always wondered why I couldn’t reach the top shelves.)