324 South 42nd Street, (West Philadelphia).
Sunday, June 1st
We took our long, triumphant walk through the dead streets of Schenectady to the Chinatown Bus stop around 6 in the morning. I hadn't gotten any sleep, anxious to leave and honestly anticipating some last-minute obstacle to stop us from boarding the bus. Thankfully, we did get to Philadelphia six hours later. The first thing we did was eat at New Harmony, the all-vegan Chinese restaurant in the heart of Chinatown. We got a cab to the house instead of trying to figure out how to get there. Each of us came with nothing more than one piece of rolling luggage and a backpack each. Tia brought her teddy bear and blanket and I brought my dirtiest pillow. Approaching the doorstep, we were welcomed by the strong odor of rotting trash piling up outside of the big living room window. It smelled like a dead animal. We rang all three doorbells, but no one answered. We called a kid named Danny whose number was given to all the new tenants. He was the only full-time resident and was given the duty of ushering everyone in and giving them their keys. He told us he wouldn't be able to be there for a couple hours, so we just sat there on the stairs.
We were in University City, an affluent area of West Philly dominated by the University of Pennsylvania and real estate exclusive to students. Our block was kept in the shade by the large trees that hung overhead. Tossed loveseats, bookshelves, and dressers lined the sidewalks, wasted by privileged kids whose new furniture was as single-serving and disposable as fast food. $3,000 roadbikes were locked up along the small fences around the uniform apartment buildings. A campus police officer stood at almost every corner of every block, in fluorescent yellow vests, as if to suggest that this community were so much more important than the others that they needed 24-hour protection from outsiders. To our right, a shirtless bro sat in the back of a parked pick-up truck, wearing shades and smoking a pipe with his lady friend. We had infiltrated a neighborhood our kind was never meant to step foot in. Thankfully, a girl who was subletting named Allie showed up and let us in.
We found our room, a large space with a high ceiling in the back, and got comfortable on the wooden floor. The second bedroom on the first floor was the only one that was furnished, but that kid wanted a $500 deposit to move into it, so we took the one without. We had more space in our room than we'd ever need and it was connected to a small, superfluous second room that lead to a back patio. We had two small closets and what appeared to be an inoperable oven from another century that served as shelves and cupboards. The living room was modest and had a small loveseat that sat in front of a table and an empty stand where I imagine a TV was supposed to go. The kitchen had a lot of counter space and the rich college kids had left behind a decent selection of utensils. Danny showed up and gave us the tour, then the keys. In the basement, we had a washer and dryer. He told us there were cafes and stores two blocks up and around the corner. As we found out, the strongest wifi connection that appeared, "Pussy Castle", wasn't ours. We actually wouldn't have wifi for another day, so we walked over to a place called Saxby's. There were no available outlets and virtually nothing vegan-friendly, so we went over to Qdoba instead and loitered there online for a couple hours, looking around and writing down things to do in the upcoming weeks.
It was exciting to suddenly be in a city where things were constantly happening, even if it was in a part of town where I felt like a total alien. We knew it'd be short-lived. We knew we'd wind up in one of the city's respective ghettos by the end of August, our deadline to find our forever home. When Qdoba closed, we headed back to the apartment. Danny had said something about all the other tenants getting together upstairs to become acquainted, but we avoided doing that. They were loud and obnoxious up there and I had already overheard a conversation about drugs. I had no interest whatsoever in knowing anyone else in the house. We took full advantage of our new city and had an extra-large vegan pizza delivered to us. It was the first time we'd ever gotten to do such a thing. We had to sleep on the floor, but sleeping on a floor there would always be preferred over sleeping on a bed in Schenectady.
Monday, June 2nd
The kid whose room we were subletting told us there'd be a bed delivered to us the next morning. It never came. When we called him, he said they told him they'd been there but that no one answered the door or my number. That was because Jess had my phone back in Schenectady, and even though I let her borrow it so she could receive calls, she ignored it when it was ringing that morning. As a result, we had to set up another delivery appointment and spend another night on the floor. At the same time wifi was installed in the house that morning, the electricity on just our floor went out. So even though we now had wifi, we had no way of charging our laptops, both of which were running on dead batteries and wouldn't stay on unless plugged in. Were we cursed? We tried to make the best of it and left for the entire day to explore the city. We found out there was an all-vegan restaurant called HipCityVeg right around the corner from us on S 40th. There was also a great used book store, a 24-hour grocery store, a post office, a comic book shop, and a surcharge-free ATM. It was overwhelming: Everything we'd ever need, more or less, was half a mile away from our doorstep. It was almost comical how opposite of Schenectady it was.
After eating an amazing buffalo ranch fried chicken burger with sweet potato fries and aioli dip, we took out a ton of money and got together the first month's rent. It was $500 a month, split 50/50. We stumbled across a cute little comic shop called Locust Moon and had to go in. It was so awesome. It even had two cats living in it, one of whom was named Rooster. We rode the subway, which only cost me $1 because I had a Medicaid card. We went to the movies and saw a documentary about obesity and sugar called Fed Up. It was really good. It talked about the actual daily recommended amount of sugar, how too much sugar is single-handedly killing us all, declared "Big Soda" the new "Big Tobacco", and sent me into an existential crisis about my soda consumption. It seriously made me feel like I could never drink soda or juice or tea ever again. I felt not straightedge for drinking soda, as stupid as that may sound. The first thing we did afterwards was step into the first grocery store we saw and evaluated the sugar content of some of our favorite vegan foods. Thankfully, they were all virtually sugarless. However, just one two-liter of soda a day is a hundred times what you should be consuming. We browsed Philly AIDs Thrift, a thrift store whose proceeds go towards AIDs, and came across an awesome oddities shop called Bizarre Bazaar: Professor Ouch's Odditorium just next door, which had obscure collector items, horror movie merchandise, vintage nick-knacks, and a little exhibit in the back of preserved medical and animal anomalies. We went into Vegan Tree, which was sold out of almost everything they had, and got some chicken nuggets with sushi. It was maybe the best sushi I'd ever eaten.
Asking for directions, a nice stranger welcomed us enthusiastically to the city. We found out the 42 went between west and south Philly all day. We didn't really want to go back to our dark, worthless apartment, so we hung out back at HipCityVeg until they closed at 11 instead, using their wifi and drinking their shakes.
A tree covered in stuffed animals stands outside of Philly AIDs Thrift.
An abandoned building on South Street was covered in stickers where the public were granted the opportunity to say what they wished the place was.
An all too appropriate button I bought at Bizarre Bazaar.
Outside of a library in South Philly.
Tuesday, June 3rd
The next morning, Jess called me from an unfamiliar number and told me that the FBI and Department of Homeland Security had taken my cellphone from her. Even though I was totally confused by the news, my body knew to fill with the electric stab of anxiety. The curse continued. She had been in the middle of an intake appointment at a mental health facility that morning when someone knocked at the door of the interview room. The doctor answered it and it was a couple big men with badges: one man from the night at the police station, one claiming to be with the FBI, and one claiming to be with the Department of Homeland Security. She said they immediately started asking about me and that when she mentioned having my phone they asked for it, promising she'd get it back the next day. Against her better judgment, she gave it to them without hesitation. Now neither of us had a phone and I had to begin worrying about whether or not they'd find something in my history of texts to bother me about. This was the Department of Homeland Security, after all. Could a text in passing about wanting cops to be killed get me locked up? I had a whole bunch of new worries, once again all because of Jess, what she had done, and her inability to ever do the right thing. I spent the entire day freaking out about it. I had so many questions I needed answered, but had only one detective's number to call with them and no guarantee that anything these cops would say was even true.
Was I being investigated or not? They continued to bring up that her son had told them I'd taken a picture of him while he peed. They were apparently sticking with that story, as unbelievable as it was, even trying to guilt-trip her with it by saying, "You're going to trust some guy you met over the Internet over your own son?!" I couldn't figure it out: Either they had manipulated him into actually saying something that incriminated me and they were considering me a suspect, or they were simply lying to her to trick her into telling them something they assumed she knew about me. Maybe they were just after her and when they realized who I was they figured they'd use her as easy access to building a case against me for other reasons? My imagination went in a thousand different directions because I knew the government and the police could do whatever they wanted to whoever they wanted whenever they wanted--and why not fuck with a loudmouthed vegan anarchist blogger? I was more paranoid than ever before. Thankfully, I thought to myself, no one knew my new address. The police officially had my digital camera and my cellphone and I'd have to go home to get them back eventually. I kept having daydreams of going to the station to get them and being arrested for terrorism. When the bed was delivered that day, I was so physically exhausted from all the new stresses that I fell right to sleep on it, using a curtain as a blanket. I almost forgot that Tom never got back to us as he'd promised about whether or not we'd be getting our security deposit back from the apartment back in Schenectady.
Wednesday, June 4th
The next morning, the curse wasn't finished dumping more bad news on me. I had a message from my little sister on Facebook saying to call her immediately. Obviously, almost no one had Tia's number and therefore couldn't get a hold of me. She answered, crying, and got right to the words, "We lost Nana." My grandmother was dead. She had slipped into a coma in the hospital and passed slowly in her sleep shortly after. Because I didn't have my phone, I had missed the voicemails from my aunt with the news. I was the last to find out. I had neglected my last chance to see her before I moved because of my mother. Surprisingly, I didn't cry. It didn't sink in as a new reality for a while. Maybe it was because I was so distracted by all the other terrible things happening, or the brief enjoyments of being in Philadelphia.
My grandmother was not always a good person. She was oftentimes manipulative and cruel. She criticized me endlessly and harshly for everything I did and was. She used the little that she did for me against me when it was convenient for her and tried to control me by doing so. She was a compulsive liar. She harbored racist and homophobic attitudes. She had sneaked animal products into dinners she'd made me in the past for months at a time. She made me feel bad about myself a lot. She showed no mercy about forcing my parents on me and sometimes even threatened to use them against me as a weapon. At the end of the day, though, looking over my twenty-six years on this planet and remembering my relationship with my direct family, she was really the only one who was there for me. I'll never be able to say for sure whether she did this out of genuine selflessness and care, but she was who I moved in with when I stopped going home at the age of fifteen. Even before then, she was my only escape from my abusive home on weekends when I was a child. Every time I found myself homeless, I had a room to stay in at her house. She'd be finished with our arguments even when I wasn't, ready to cook me a dinner or give me a ride somewhere. She couldn't go a week without calling me and seeing how I was doing. She was really the only consistent family I had and she was now gone. I would never hear her voice again or get a ride to the grocery store from her. Deleting her home phone number from my contacts was surreal and tragic.
I had to put her death to the side and continue calling Detective Sherman, the asshole who had my camera. He had ignored my calls the day before, so I had no other choice but to start calling him and leaving messages over and over again after 4. This time, he got back to me. He insisted I wasn't under investigation, but that Jess was, and that the only reason they wanted my phone was because she had access to it. I took it with a grain of salt because all cops are liars, but it did offer some slight relief. Tia and I went out and bought a fan, then some groceries. Our electricity was back on, so we got fruit from a small stand and made banana strawberry smoothies with a blender that was left behind. The days were long and hot there, so we drank up while sitting directly in front of the fan on high. Tom got back to us after we called him repeatedly and said he'd taken and sent pictures of the apartment to our landlady to show her we had cleaned everything up and didn't leave behind any damages. He said he told her to release our deposit right away, but she was about to be on vacation and was hesitating. We walked to Locust Moon and hung out there for almost two hours. I sat and read two books, enjoying their air conditioning. Tia got to chime in on some dorky conversation about anime or something. She's better at being a human being than I am. We couldn't resist eating at HipCity again, even though it was pricey. We also decided to check out the used book store, which was open unusually late. When we asked about their hours, the owner said, "I play it by ear." I bought a memoir called Another Bullshit Night In Suck City.
Thursday, June 5th
I woke up early the next morning to the loud snap of a huge cockroach being crushed underneath Tia's foot. Yes, we were in another place with cockroaches. We also were infested with very tiny black ants. The day was a little more relaxed and we spent the entire time exploring some more. We went to an art store that Tia had always dreamed of going to called Dick Blick. The neighborhood we were in was called the "Gayborhood". It even said it on Google Maps and the street signs had rainbows underneath them. We ate at a hotdog place called Hot Diggity, but its vegan options were very limited and the food was underwhelming. We stopped at Wooden Shoe, too. That night, we went to the movies again to see Alejandro Jodorowski's new film, Dance of Reality. It was amazing. I think it was the first time the both of us had seen a foreign film on the big screen. We bought a bunch of premade vegan sandwiches and burgers from Fresh Grocer, but they were all disgusting.
This poor moth got sucked into the vent.
There's always something neat to look at in the city.
Friday, June 6th
Meanwhile, back in Schenectady, Jess was trying to get by on her own. After I left the state, she was left with few options. The man working her case from CPS was helping her figure things out and DSS had paid for her to stay at the sketchy motel on the corner of my old block, Moyston. She got by on food stamps, though she had no microwave in her room. She spent most of the days walking here and there, going to meetings with CPS, and trying to find more stable, safe shelter. She contacted me every chance she got by asking strangers to use their phone. She had also, perhaps out of loneliness and desperation, started talking to just about anyone who would give her the time of day. Of course, none of these people were at all the healthiest of people to be talking to. Two of them were a couple of traveler punks who had yelled to her about coming to get drunk with them in a tent while she exited the library. The others were a motley crew of scumbags who worked at a tattoo shop. She had gone to a few shops to show them her art and basically ask for a free apprenticeship or job. These lowlifes obviously saw it as an opportunity and took advantage, so she soon began doing menial labor, like walking the owner's pit bulls who were neglected and confined in the back for most of their days, some covered in their own feces. She cleaned up dog diarrhea, ran errands, bought things from the store for them, and endured occasional perverted comments, the presence of drugs and guns, and shoddy tattoo artistry. One of the kids who worked there was a locally known rapist. I didn't know the extent of how sketchy the place was for at least a week because she intentionally kept details from me to keep me from worrying and to avoid having to face that my initial concerns were warranted.
She eventually started staying in a decent women's shelter where she had her own room. Of course, this wasn't without stipulations that made her life nearly impossible. She was only allowed to use the phone between 7 and 9 at night for five minutes, so I started hearing from her nightly, but was unable to start or have any legitimate conversations with her. I had ordered her a government phone that she was still waiting on. We argued at least once a day over the phone. Much of it was because I couldn't say anything to her without her getting mad. If tried to vent about the bad things, she'd bring up how much worse she had it; if I boasted about any good things, she'd respond sarcastically, usually with a deep sigh, and bring up how jealous she was of me. A lot of it had to do with the fact that she constantly tried to guilt-trip me for leaving her behind. She kept telling me it was a choice that I made because she wasn't important to me, repeating that if I really loved her, I'd do this and that. Moving to Philadelphia without her wasn't a choice, though; it was an obligation. I had responsibilities, goals, and owed it to my friends who were in on it with me. Had things not gone the way they did with her, she would have been moving there with me. By the time everything came to light, there simply was no going back on everything we'd already started. In my mind, I knew she was lucky I was even humoring the idea of being with her still. The fact that she still seemingly felt entitled to not just my devotion but to me further reconstructing my life for her was unbelievable. I had betrayed myself repeatedly and contorted myself into emotional and mental positions I never thought I could withstand for her over the last month or two. Most of my savings were depleted because I had instead invested in making sure we had a chance to be a couple. My friends had to sit back and watch me be the victim of an abusive relationship. I volunteered to be a stepfather, even! I couldn't believe she still expected more of me, but there was no reasoning with her and it always just disintegrated into yelling and me eventually hanging up out of frustration.
That day, we took a bus way out to the social security offices so I could try to get my benefits transferred. When we got there, I was told that I'd have to come back Monday morning. We walked through a 'hood, joking about how it was where we were gonna wind up after the sublet was up. People were really nice, though, and always friendly and eager to help when we asked for directions or anything. I decided to take the long bus ride to Germantown and show Tia The Nile Cafe, one of my favorite vegan soul food joints in the whole country.
Strawberry banana ice cream!
Logan Square!
Another shop kitty.
Saturday, June 7th
We dropped our rent into a post office box and took two buses in the excruciating heat to a classic Philly event, Punk Rock Flea Market. It had coincidentally been happening during several other past visits to the city, but I had never gone. It was happening at an old warehouse that used to be owned by FedEx and had over 500 vendors selling used stuff and original creations. The idea was so fucking cool, but after less than two hours of browsing, I had only felt compelled to buy a cupcake. There was a lot of cool stuff there, ranging from original artwork to amusing t-shirts to upcycled inner-tube accessories to hand-painted cult icon Christmas ornaments, but just as much of it was obnoxious, pandering punk bullshit: a seemingly endless supply of vinyl and VHS tapes, things referencing beer (including a tote bag that simply said "Drink Beer and Make Stuff"), and "random" designs that took obvious trends and just mixed them together (cats + pizza = super cool!). There was even one table run by a girl who was selling DIY patches that had the Tumblr logo painted on them.
Tia took forever because she's obsessed with clothes, so I went looking for food. Outside, I saw a homeless man with a flaky, decaying leg wrapped in plastic bags sitting on the ground. He asked for some money, so I gave him $5. He looked up at me with a hanging jaw and said, "Are you fo' real?! I've been out here all day, and now that it's ending, you come along!" He pointed to a pile of spare change on the ground and said, "This is all I got today!" I knelt down and apologized for my generation, ranting that these kids who talk about change can't spare any. He agreed and shared his pessimism: "I don't see a president coming outta this generation. How old are you? After your generation, it's over!" We ate at New Harmony, then went home and slept a little. Jess woke me up with a call and screamed at me a lot. I don't even remember what for, but it actually made me cry. I felt so crippled by her.