The Great Scholar: Day One

If God loves me, a corkscrew will be at the top of this box.

I say this as I slice open one of two yet-to-be unpacked boxes stacked in my bedroom. I don’t even remember what I put inside them a month ago.

My first night of classes was a sweaty nightmare, where I got my classes confused – believing a Thursday class met on Wednesday; THEN getting lost trying to locate aforementioned Thursday class on Wednesday; THEN, once finding the classroom, realizing no one was there; THEN having to find the information desk to find out where the class was meeting, only to be told that Kelly Wolfe – you great scholar you – the class meets on THURSDAY not WEDNESDAY; THEN having to ask the woman at the information desk what class I was actually supposed to be at; THEN, realizing I had forgotten which classroom the woman told me to go to as soon as I walked away; THEN having to go back to the information desk and ask again; THEN having to take with me a massive, color-coded campus map marked – humiliatingly – with big black Xs and arrows.

I pour the wine and remember that this is what I said I wanted. This is everything I said I wanted.

The good news is God loves me.

I’m walking into spider webs, so leave a message and I’ll call you back

I liked my new landlady – Lala -- immediately. And the longer she talks, the more I like her.

“I’m pro-spider,” she says, while pouring me a cup of coffee from beans smuggled into the country from Nicaragua – beans she ground herself this morning. She slams a pint of soy creamer in front of me and tosses a teaspoon in a glass sugar bowl like the one my mom reserved only for company. Today she’s wearing a royal-blue T-shirt that hugs a slender, athletic figure that appears – at least to me – a helluva lot more youthful than her 63 years.

“But all those webs start to make a house look, well, not so lived in,” Lala says. “So, I had to take a few down. I hate that.”

I kind of wish Lala had told me she was pro-spider before I rented the sunny yellow room overlooking a pretty, winding road – only three miles from campus – for the outrageously reasonable price of $550 a month including utilities. But on the other hand, my Grandma was pro-spider too, a woman who believed that spiders in your house brought luck.

For me, personally, it all depends. I grew up in a little house in rural Florida in the black, cool shadow of a great Oak that I am sure was already an adult when Hernando de Soto landed in Florida. We were constantly invaded by grey wood spiders as large as my hand is today – absolutely massive. I shudder now to think of it. But that also means that I’m not bothered much by the little guys – the smaller spiders most people see in their homes. I couldn’t care less about them.

Lala’s house is a cozy, old split level with a large deck over-looking a wild, green, wooded park. There’s at least one funky painting on every wall – three paintings in my bathroom alone. The parts of the house that are not covered in books are covered in plants – ivy spiraling its way toward the creaky, hardwood floors like a bored, naughty Rapunzel. I love it here.

Lala and I share the house with a young man I’ll call Hot Gary who lives, according to Lala, “under the kitchen.” Every once in a while, two fat, fluffy, white kitty cats named Pushkin and Charlie make an appearance.

Lala is tall, strong, and very attractive. She wears her hair in a short, blond wispy cut that manages to be both jaunty and chic. She has a booming voice – and appears to truly enjoy the company of others. She keeps seeking me out while I am desperately trying to put away my things. This is one of the few chicks I’ve ever met in my life who makes me look like a shrinking violet. And her laugh comes from some cave buried in the pit of her belly -- like the bellow of a lioness in her prime. Together, we’re loud as hell.

I soon learn that a conversation with Lala could go in any direction at any time. It’s sort of like riding Space Mountain. I’m sipping my coffee and trying to hang on.

“Ever notice how occult people are really wacky?” she asks me.

No, I think. You don’t say? Please DO go on. (If there’s anything I love more than crazy people, I honestly don’t know what it is.)

Somehow, my asking for directions to Target turns into her show-stopping description of trying to have shower sex with a boyfriend so paralyzed by obsessive compulsive disorder that he simply couldn’t get interested in her naked self until the towels were folded just right. And don’t even get her started on the inappropriate time outs for squeegee-ing.

“It was just not sexy,” Lala says.

“No,” I answer. “I can’t imagine how it would be.”

We laugh. We’re both horrifically loud. It’s only a matter of time before the neighbors file a noise complaint. Hot Gary may move out.

I return an hour later with red and white bags stuffed with new, white linens and blue hangers.

I set to work putting away half a dozen Space Bags filled with winter clothes I haven’t seen in eight years. That’s when the proverbial itsy-bitsy spider bungee jumps from a web attached to the ceiling and seems to stop right in front of my face – as if checking me out. It’s so teeny – about half the size of my pinky nail – that I’m neither alarmed nor afraid. I step around it, trying to respect Lala’s pro-spider household and hoping Grandma was right – that the pale little guy will bring me some luck.

I’m in an entirely different corner of the room when the same little spider dive bombs me again – twice now stopping right in front of my face – greeting me or giving me shit, depending on your perspective.

OK. Now I’m annoyed. Because I am trying to get things done dammit and I don’t speak spider for crying out loud and I don’t know what this little guy wants from me. The spider is now reminding me of one of those people on the plane who keeps talking despite that fact that you have so obviously opened a book and are trying to read/ignore him.

I’m back at the closet, trying to decide if I really need my red velvet smoking jacket or if it can go under the bed for the time being -- I like it because it makes me feel like Hugh Hefner -- when the little spider makes a third appearance. Again, dropping right down in front of my face.

At this point, I’m really annoyed. Here, I had tried to respect this little spider’s space – but it was obviously just trying to fuck with me. I was over it. Who’s at the top of food chain here, anyway?

So I just grabbed that tee-tiny spider by its little web and cast it on the floor. I felt bad for the spider. I felt bad for Lala. And I hope I hadn’t damaged any good luck headed my way.

But I just dropped everything to be here -- and anything getting in my face right now is going to have hell to pay.

Notes on a new life: I look like shit

In the past 11 days, I’ve driven to Virginia, found a place to live, moved in, sold four pieces of Brandon’s furniture, helped move some of Brandon’s things, helped Brandon pack some of his things, met Brandon’s fiancé, visited campus, signed up for classes, called half a dozen yoga studios looking for a new place to practice, and lined up two interviews for part-time work to supplement my modest teaching stipend.

And I did it all while sleeping on Brandon’s couch. Which means, in short, I look like shit.

I’m so sleepy, I almost got into a car accident with a cop last night. For whatever reason, he took pity on me and let me go with a warning. But today I feel like I’m plowing through all my good karma with stupid traffic violations and I won’t have any left when the adorable French guy – mid 40s, divorced, grown kids – sits next to me in my non-fiction class. (I know this is going to happen because I’ve been meditating on it at yoga.)

I don't want to whine about being tired because, frankly, I'm living my dream -- and a lot of other people's dreams if what you tell me is true. Plus, as a western woman, I try to remember I don’t have a lot to complain about. Not really. Not when I have access to hot water, a toilet, a working automobile, and enough food to keep my rear end in its Kardashian-like glory. I think it’s vulgar to complain about little things when our sisters in the Congo are being systematically gang-raped as part of political maneuvering. I’m sure those girls would take a look at me in this luxury condo two blocks from the metro and say “Oh, poor thing. You tired on that couch? Well, I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night in the refugee camp, either, Bitch.”

But today I have to be more than grateful. I have to look halfway decent. And that's going to be a challenge. I have an interview for a part-time job. I don’t want to tell you all that much about it because I’m superstitious about these things. (I know you find this surprising – a gal who drops everything to write in the midst of the worst recession since the Great Depression, who is addicted to yoga, who believes whole-heartedly in karma, and is trying to will a French lover into her life through meditation -- is also superstitious. I’m not even going to tell you how I feel about the dark.)

And since I don’t know where my hair dryer is, and my current look is starting to edge toward – how shall I say? Rastafarian? I booked an appointment for a shampoo and blow-out at a nearby salon.

I was put in the capable hands of Veronica, a tee-tiny little Romanian thing with big blue eyes and arms that would make Madonna seethe with jealousy. She asked me how I wanted my hair. I don’t like it when stylists ask this. I have no idea. Make me look like that Russian spy. That would be nice.

“Not like this," I told her. "Extra points if you make me look like a girl again.”

First, Veronica shampooed me, and I fell asleep in the sink. She woke me up to me in the chair at her station, where I promptly fell asleep again. That blow-dryer made the most delicious white noise and the cape was so warm. When I came too, Veronica's itty bitty self had wrestled my hair into shiny submission. I couldn’t believe it.

“Wow,” I said. “I can’t believe it.”

I left her a huge tip. She gave me her card.

“When you get settled in your new place, make a wish,” she said. “In Romania, that’s what we do. When you move into some place new, make a wish.”

“Did you make a wish,” I asked her.

“Yes.”

“Did it come true?” I asked.

“Well, it’s sort of a long time thing.”

“I hear ya sister,” I said.

When I left, I felt my hair bouncing in my wake. It felt good to have something in my life in order. I was grateful for that.

Notes on a new life: Toolbox

Call me Ishmael. I’m a whale of a pain in your ass.

That’s what I’m thinking while the zygote in the next room clad in his Virginia Tech T-shirt and fashionably-distressed khaki shorts looks over Brandon’s old particle-board desk. We put it on craigslist for $25 – and now the kid is looking at it under a jeweler’s loop.

“How old is it,” he asks. I don’t know how old the damn thing is. I’ve known Brandon10 years, and he’s had it that long. It’s safe to assume most of the furniture in Brandon’s apartment could be described as pre-Etruscan.

Ishmael is tiptoeing through a cavern of boxes because Brandon and I are both in various stages of moving. I’ve been crashing on the couch for more than a week after driving up from Florida. My suitcase is vomiting black T-shirts and denim next to the stack of bedding I fold up every day so the room has some semblance of order.

Occasionally, Ishmael will touch something, ask how much it is, and then how old it is. What the hell do I look like? Antiques Roadshow?

When I was looking for places to rent, the lady who chose me to move into her house said she liked me because I seemed laid back. Which I am. But now that I’m home wheeling and dealing while Brandon is at work – lucky duck -- I see what she means.

The desk is $25 for crying out loud. And the guy is acting like I’m asking for a testicle. What makes matters worse is that I can tell this is the kind of douche who will pay that much for a Grey Goose martini on U Street Saturday night.

Plus, I’m still thinking about the little incident in the parking garage. He refused to park on the street outside the condo and put his flashers on. So, I let him into the parking garage. Where he immediately drove into another car, bashing the shit out of it. Then, he checks out his own car, and walks off as if nothing happened. Bad karma. Bad karma everywhere. This is not the yoga way. I kind of wave my hands in front of my face to divert any bad energy. He looks at me as if I'm the one with the problem.

After an hour of my life I’ll never get back, Ishmael decides he’ll take the desk. But he needs a tool to take it apart to fit into his car. I think of about a dozen tool jokes in my head, but am proud of myself when I manage to keep them all between my ears. Then he asks if he can take Brandon’s screwdriver to put the desk back together when he gets home. Is he crazy? No, I tell him. You can’t. Brandon needs that. Jeebus.

Happy our little interlude is almost over, I help Ishmael haul the desk out of the condo, down the hall, into the elevator, and into his shiny new Honda SUV paid for by the folks. We get everything squared away and he goes to get into his SUV.

Then he turns, seems to think about something, and without a word pulls the screwdriver out of his pocket. That’s right. He almost stole the screwdriver I told him he couldn’t take. Why he gave it a second thought, I have no idea. I didn’t see him take it. He could have gotten away with it.

He hands it to me. I take it.

“Thanks,” I say, and walk away.