Slumming It - II
I moved into this place at the start of a work week, had an onslaught of life matters to attend to that week, come home every day by bus, and consequently: I spent the first week in a tiny clearing on the floor, hemmed in by my stuff piled from floor to ceiling. I had so much stuff crammed in that I couldn't move enough stuff to make room to move stuff so I could have room to set up a bed. I began to suffer an awful claustrophobia, which hasn't subsided much even as my room has become organized.
Because it wasn't just having to sleep on the floor and maneuver through jagged-edged junk that brought me to space madness. I have this tiny room separated from what is, as far as I'm concerned, the outside world, by paper-thin walls. My entire personal space extends only a few feet in every direction. I am surrounded by strangers in 5 of the 6 directions. I have to put on clothes to use the bathroom. Once I went to use the bathroom, and someone I didn't know was walking out of it... I said "Hey..." and he nodded "Hey" and walked out of the apartment. I have flashbacks of needing to go backwards in the pipe.
The pipes aren't nightmares, they were part of my childhood (as a rat, one would assume). My father would take me down into the sewer/drainage system on several occasions, but this was when I was 6. This is only one of many pipe episodes that make people accuse my father of being a terrible parent, though when I try to think of his good qualities I immediately recall these adventures. It was 1991, SE Massachusetts, and we were in a drainage pipe. It was pitch black. There is 100% humidity down there; nothing evaporates, and it's suffocating. He had a flashlight but I was in front, blocking the light in front of me. He was herding me forward, and we climbed deeper and deeper into the pipe, which got more and more cramped. Everything in front of me is dark. It's getting tighter and tighter, and I go from crawling on all fours to crawling on my belly. None of the sweat is able to leave my skin. I don't know if I'm going to be able to get to the end. I feel more and more trapped. There is not enough room to turn around, so if I have to get out then I have to push myself backwards the whole half-mile or so. The horror... too cramped to even be able to turn around. I'm going to die in this pipe. There is no way out, I can't just say "I'm done with this" and get out, I am trapped and it is so hot, I am going to bake to death stuck in this steamy pipe.
Finally, it opens. Contents of pipe evacuated like an aborted fetus. Now we are underground.
But what opening is there for me? I realize now that my room is too small to actually fit the amount of stuff I have, that my bed takes up over half of my space. That I have signed a lease, been given a prison sentence, confined for the lease term to this prison cell. Everyone can hear everything that goes on in my cell, and I am a stranger in my own kitchen and living room.
I was 7. We broke into a coastal lookout tower from WWII. The stairs were rusted out and the bottom flight was missing, so he hoisted me up to the second flight, which was loosely hanging off of the third. Then he jumped from a piece of rubble and hoisted himself up after me, causing the entire staircase to shake. My mouth gaped in silent horror. Then we climbed to the top floor, the observation deck. There was one narrow window, overlooking the ocean, and outside the window was a 6-inch ledge. He made up his mind that he would to walk all the way around it. He went out the window, out onto the ledge, and shimmied around the corner. I stayed inside, sobbing, sure he would perish and wondering what I would do when I was sure he was never coming back through the window.
When I lie in bed and close my eyes, I can see the outline of the walls of my gerbil cage. I lie awake listening to the sound of nazi zombies biting the dust, or absent that the skidding of sneakers on clay as night hoops continues into the early morning hours.
Another bunker... had an area between the inner and outer wall that was maybe a couple feet wide. Dark, and filled with stagnant water. I'm not sure what the purpose of it was. But we found a way to get into it, and went all the way around the half-mile perimeter, clinging to the inside the walls of the bunker. Crawling inside the wall like rats. Creatures.
Because it wasn't just having to sleep on the floor and maneuver through jagged-edged junk that brought me to space madness. I have this tiny room separated from what is, as far as I'm concerned, the outside world, by paper-thin walls. My entire personal space extends only a few feet in every direction. I am surrounded by strangers in 5 of the 6 directions. I have to put on clothes to use the bathroom. Once I went to use the bathroom, and someone I didn't know was walking out of it... I said "Hey..." and he nodded "Hey" and walked out of the apartment. I have flashbacks of needing to go backwards in the pipe.
The pipes aren't nightmares, they were part of my childhood (as a rat, one would assume). My father would take me down into the sewer/drainage system on several occasions, but this was when I was 6. This is only one of many pipe episodes that make people accuse my father of being a terrible parent, though when I try to think of his good qualities I immediately recall these adventures. It was 1991, SE Massachusetts, and we were in a drainage pipe. It was pitch black. There is 100% humidity down there; nothing evaporates, and it's suffocating. He had a flashlight but I was in front, blocking the light in front of me. He was herding me forward, and we climbed deeper and deeper into the pipe, which got more and more cramped. Everything in front of me is dark. It's getting tighter and tighter, and I go from crawling on all fours to crawling on my belly. None of the sweat is able to leave my skin. I don't know if I'm going to be able to get to the end. I feel more and more trapped. There is not enough room to turn around, so if I have to get out then I have to push myself backwards the whole half-mile or so. The horror... too cramped to even be able to turn around. I'm going to die in this pipe. There is no way out, I can't just say "I'm done with this" and get out, I am trapped and it is so hot, I am going to bake to death stuck in this steamy pipe.
Finally, it opens. Contents of pipe evacuated like an aborted fetus. Now we are underground.
But what opening is there for me? I realize now that my room is too small to actually fit the amount of stuff I have, that my bed takes up over half of my space. That I have signed a lease, been given a prison sentence, confined for the lease term to this prison cell. Everyone can hear everything that goes on in my cell, and I am a stranger in my own kitchen and living room.
I was 7. We broke into a coastal lookout tower from WWII. The stairs were rusted out and the bottom flight was missing, so he hoisted me up to the second flight, which was loosely hanging off of the third. Then he jumped from a piece of rubble and hoisted himself up after me, causing the entire staircase to shake. My mouth gaped in silent horror. Then we climbed to the top floor, the observation deck. There was one narrow window, overlooking the ocean, and outside the window was a 6-inch ledge. He made up his mind that he would to walk all the way around it. He went out the window, out onto the ledge, and shimmied around the corner. I stayed inside, sobbing, sure he would perish and wondering what I would do when I was sure he was never coming back through the window.
When I lie in bed and close my eyes, I can see the outline of the walls of my gerbil cage. I lie awake listening to the sound of nazi zombies biting the dust, or absent that the skidding of sneakers on clay as night hoops continues into the early morning hours.
Another bunker... had an area between the inner and outer wall that was maybe a couple feet wide. Dark, and filled with stagnant water. I'm not sure what the purpose of it was. But we found a way to get into it, and went all the way around the half-mile perimeter, clinging to the inside the walls of the bunker. Crawling inside the wall like rats. Creatures.