The passing of time, the marking of milestones, commemorative coincidences...such things don't normally interest those devoted to living in the moment.
Yet as i sit here in my new home, i'm struck by resonances of the first article that ever appeared on this site. Almost ten years ago, i looked out my second-story city window and said hello to you.
Tonight, i look out another second-story window onto a city street, and it feels like a new birth has begun. Indeed, the main reason i returned to urban life after five years in a bucolic beach bungalow, is to maximize my literary voice in the world. I took some humblingly satisfying public-speaking baby steps on that Gulf of Mexico island...and now, i'm in one of the most famously progressive cities on the planet, ready to make writing and public speaking my primary means of interaction with my species.
Hello San Francisco! How is your spirit?
I've been here less than a week, but i've been in the Bay area almost five months, most of that time in painful purgatory, waiting for a safe haven. I seem to have found it, in the last place expected - the geographic center of the third most-expensive city in the U.S. I don't know anything about Honolulu, but with respect to NYC, i don't know whose ass they kissed to get a higher ranking. I lived in that Apple for ten years, and never had a problem getting a room at the drop of a hat, for $500 or less. Yet from my temporary housing across the Bay in San Pablo, i banged my head for three months against the local financial realities, trying to find a home on my non-materialist budget. Just a little room...a glorified closet would do! The ever-changing title to this article is testament to the never-ending stress of that search, because of the unrelenting hours it absorbed every day (visits that didn't pan out, disturbingly well-written fake ads, extensive phone calls and e-mails, flaky landlords, the feeling of having my life on hold, chained to my computer because if you're not one of the first respondents when an ad comes up, your chance is gone...NO, i don't have one of those pernicious smartphone doohickies).
And then there was the other component of my stress...a live-in, obsessive/compulsive, bipolar landlord. That doesn't sound so painful when spoken in clinical terms - which is the greatest flaw of overly clinical language. This piece's original title? "Six Weeks in the Monastery". That became a gut-lurching "Ten Weeks...", then finally...
So optimism and rebirth are upon me.
But first the strange, sad tale of the most schizophrenic home i've ever known (indeed, i don't know what the minimum time requirement is for a place to psychologically qualify as "home", but i definitely passed that benchmark once i moved beyond the initial title of this piece). "Schizophrenic" isn't a comment on that landlord, though...it refers to the heavenly aspects that existed alongside the hellish. Two of my housemates were an unqualified source of joy and camaraderie. One was a source of camaraderie and misery both.
Why do i say "monastery"? Because silence was urged - except for the occasional shared movie night, no electronic devices without headphones. If you had a phone call, it was recommended you take it to the garage, or outside. Cleanliness was not next to godliness, it was the other way around - nothing out of place, and cooking dishes were to be cleaned before you eat. And NO houseguests.
None of those restrictions are inherently unreasonable...indeed, some are perfectly acceptable, even nice (for example, in silence i discovered that cactus flowers make an extraordinary popping noise when they unfurl). But most of those restrictions are distinctly unpleasant when married to obsessive compulsion.
I originally came to San Pablo as a semi-desperate choice, after two housing opportunities fell through and i faced the prospect of being the "guest who stayed too long". I'd been at my brother's for a month, first housesitting, then going with john and mary on vacations to Monterrey and Mendocino. It was all wonderful, but approaching sour time, so when i had a lovely phone chat about eastern philosophy with a landlord who would take me right away, i was off!
For my $500 a month, i got a shared living room. S, the landlord, knew upfront that i'd be continuing my search for a permanent home. With my customary positivity, i threw myself into my new surroundings...given an air mattress and a suggestion that i place it near the other tenant, i crafted a nook under the stairs. It fit the mattress perfectly, and i hung a sheet for privacy. Charming. I also devoted much more of of my time than any other tenant to cleaning and improving the home. The building itself was in a modest little condo complex, with an enviable ethnic mix.
My roommate G was from Uganda, and we hit it off beautifully. He was gentle and intelligent, a political science student at Berkeley. He wanted to become a U.N. delegate (if he could stand living long-term in such a spiritually-bankrupt country as ours, he said). As a child, he had escaped the rwandan genocide that killed most of the people he knew. Our first night, we talked about ubuntu philosophy. Later, he initiated me into the delights of dragon fruit, and invited me to visit Africa. He said that given my un-american personality, i might never leave (and that given my sexy paucity of pigmentation, ugandan women might not let me go). S, who had grown up in Iran and lived through a war, also talked eagerly with me that first night. He shared his dulcimer - lovely. The next day, he treated me to a walk in Tilden Park, and an amazing tibetan restaurant lunch. My third housemate M turned out to be one of the most gracious, humorous people i've ever known. He'd spent a lifetime in environmental and spiritual pursuits, and was also a poet. I realized i was the only non-believer in the house, but the others were anti-religious, so there was no tension. We eventually shared movie nights, and a few exquisite meals.
Heavenly.
And hellish!
The OC/bipolar factor made me feel like a guest in my own home (and an occasionally unwelcome one, at that). The no-houseguest policy hit me hard, as for the first time in five years, i had a lover! One with whom i struggled to find together time, and who could have visited me often. We met during my home search, when she was renting a room...which went to someone else, but i ended up her bed buddy, so i got the best of that deal. She was a single mother with a full-time job, so we saw each other only once a week for a few hours...plus innumerable garage Skype sessions.
Understand, a part of me has such admiration and hope for S. He's one of the sincerest people you'll ever meet, and perhaps one of the few who is actually making fundamental changes to his personality. I never spoke the word "bipolar" to him, because it's so heavy and permanent-sounding. With what we're learning about the plasticity of the human brain, i truly do think that he's pursuing spiritually-evolved attitudes so diligently, that ten years from now his bipolar issues may be gone. But holy clusterfuck, it is stunningly, soul-crushingly hard to live with a bipolar human being. I am in awe of my aunt, who has spent decades doing it. I truly don't understand how's she's survived. It's not the outbursts that destroy you...it's the omnipresent awareness that one might happen at any time. S's issues meant that everything had to be just right...which is hard enough when you have your own room to retreat to, but brutal without even that. Two or three times, i left an unwashed dish in the sink, and his reaction would either be condescending unpleasantry, or outright insanity as he viciously misremembered reality. I knew, i KNEW, that it wasn't him, it was his demons. I knew not to take it personally. Having the strength of will to not be affected though, was beyond me. I chided him once, saying that the only people who could be happy in his house are monks. He didn't understand how serious i was. In conversation, he also displayed energy vampire qualities - if he got going, he wouldn't even slow down to breathe. I realized that for our talks to be balanced, i would have to continuously and aggressively interrupt him...which was NOT going to happen, given my gentle personality and the diminished emotional walls that have been the by-product of my own spirit quest. I made an occasional attempt to be honest with him, but mostly i focused on keeping the peace. I looked forward to the time when i could give him the full measure of my understanding...which he might eagerly accept. I would share my theory on his conversational style (perhaps in his childhood, words were one of the only places he felt safe?). And i would offer my greatest uncertainty - that having housemates now is either the absolute worst thing he could do, or the best. Or both? It's a perfect formula for spreading misery in the world, but also perhaps a way for him to force himself to keep becoming more human.
This strange existence gave me a window into all those women (and some men) who stay in abusive relationships. There is something comforting in familiarity...indeed, i'm sure it's one of our primary psychological needs. Despite the unending undercurrent of dread, there was also a level on which i bonded with and found solace in that home.
How chillingly perverse.
And our home was a haven for black widows! I was the first to discover one. Their lethal reputation is largely hype, as i've yet to meet any californian with a horror story, and most bites don't require medical attention. I was content to kill them, though...having dealt with the sleep-murdering stress of New York bedbugs and Florida mosquitoes, my veganism has made peace with insecta annihilation. Every week or two, we'd find one...once, even by my elbow as i lay in bed reading.
When opportunities finally presented themselves, G or M would commiserate with me about the stresses of our home. G had been there a year, and when he finally freed himself six weeks after i arrived, it wasn't pretty. His spiritual composure crumbled shockingly. His chief stresses were over S's cruelty, and the feeling he'd been taken advantage of financially (when i analyzed the house budget, i had to agree). Giving no notice, he just left...and soon was on the phone with S, threatening to call the police. I winced at his clumsy attack, but understood.
Yet even in his most stressful hour, S displayed flashes of advanced spirituality. In the midst of G's exodus, S realized that G had bagged up a box of Swiffer wipes S had bought. He reclaimed them...but soon put them back in G's bag. Yet there were also retaliatory, destructive impulses S was giving in to, which i made him acknowledge...but he walked back that Swiffer choice without any counsel but his own.
And M...it would be hard to overstate how much he helped my sanity. Such openness and gentle giving. After i'd been there ten weeks, he sprang free as well. I helped him move, and he stayed on good terms with S, even returning for a couple more Star Trek nights.
My last few weeks brought two new housemates, both coincidentally from Pakistan. The first gave his thirty-day notice three days after he arrived (but i'm not sure why, as he wasn't interacting with S). The second lasted forty-six hours before being evicted for smoking. It was unfortunate, and partly due to cultural differences (smoking-wise, Pakistan is where we were thirty years ago). I was sad, because even though he was a fundamentalist misogynist, he was perhaps quite progressive back home. His first night, he was rather lost and alone, having left his home soil for the first time only two days before. I gave him comfort...when he and S had their eviction argument, they huddled around me, as a safe zone.
Chemistry is a funny thing, though. While G was there, i was fine taking care of my sexual needs behind that hanging sheet...but when a new roommate moved in, i no longer felt that comfort.
A few nights after i left, i had a dream in which S and i were attending a community college class. When i later found him on a city street corner, he had been in an accident. He was sitting up and maintaining his composure, such that it took me a minute to realize he had been maimed. There were bloody wounds, including a widening pool around one eye, and a broken forearm hanging at a sharp angle.
Sometimes dreams are obscure. Other times, not even a little.
And there is always, always a price to pay for the damage we do to each other...and the damage we do to ourselves.
For all the ease with which i found homes in my price range in NYC, i never actually lived in Manhattan itself. And here i am now, smack dab in some of the most coveted real estate in the world...and i'd almost rather be in a "less desirable" borough, as i like Berkeley's energy more. But i tried for three months to find a home within biking distance...
And now, thanks to rent control and a non-greedy new landlord, i'll be coming to you from ground zero of the Summer of Love.
One block from Golden Gate Park.
The zero-emissions buses connected to the cables above, pass by below.
Tomorrow, my lover may be spending her first night here. We have sex. Without condoms. Wheeee!
Perhaps money has destroyed much of the authenticity and unconventionality this city once had, as many Bay locals grumble.
But i'm here. And i'm naked.
I love you all.
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