Exile Island

In an attempt to keep my neighbor out of my hair and off the back of a milk carton, I have decided to order my groceries online. The plan is also to keep my distance from the helpful checkers at Von’s offering alternative children’s cartoon networks and asking if I like the particular scent of my panty-liners. Once again, I wonder where the boundaries lie with some people. With my luck, one of them will turn out to be my neighbor on the other side.

When in crisis we gravitate toward the familiar, cookies & milk, Ben & Jerry’s, crack & heroine. Just kidding. I am not that kind of gal. I’m a big, tacky sissy in the vice department. I prefer white wine, I like it very cold, often with a couple of ice cubes to dilute the alcohol, provide hydration, and basically make me feel a little less like a big old drunk. Of course, I love a great red, but that is for birthdays, company, and anniversaries.

Aside from liquid comfort, I can always count on my computer. It makes me feel in control. I type, it writes, I order, it delivers. It never wonders how I cook tofu or asks what I do with wheat gluten. Nope. It cares not for me, and my interests, and for that, I love it. I am at home in a land of sterile interactions producing predictable results minus human contact. Yes, all my groceries delivered to my door in seclusion, without another living soul around for yards.

That is, unless you forget to include the deliveryman, the idiot, idiot, idiot delivery man. Trust me, when I tell you that this fool made me want to call MaryEllen to make a date for lemonade and bridge. There is someone upstairs with a sick sense of humor, who sent that man to me and he/she is laughing milk out his/her nose right now. I am being taunted.

I cannot go into the details of our conversation without once again risking some sort of psychotic break. Here are just some of the highlights: aside from being two hours late, he tells me HE is having a bad day, (oh, sorry to hear that, me too.) he is getting a divorce, he doesn’t know how to be “civil” per court order (What a coincidence, I am forgetting how to be civil too), he hates her (I can see that), he knows she changed the code on this phone, he is moving to Oklahoma (poor Oklahoma), he needs a change (try silence), he informs me that Oakland is the hood (his expert opinion is based on the comedy of Carlos Mencia—which he recited in front of the children), he is going to quit his job (first brilliant thing, he has said), he called and entered his code at least a hundred times (seems to be a slow learner), so he knows the code is changed, his wife is a code-changing bitch (I hope she changed the code on her security alarm too), his friends are getting upset about missed calls, he is going to a Fourth of July party, but not on the actual Fourth, When is the Fourth? Yes, he asked me when the FOURTH of JULY is! (Answer: the 4th of July.)

Obviously, I am not friendly to him. I am not amused, I am not nice, but the beauty of this guy is that he has no idea. It is so dark and vacuous in that empty head of his that no light, no noise, no sensory triggers of any kind can reach him. He is an island. And I envy that, because I cannot seem to escape the people that are populating mine.

On a lighter note, I will be testifying on behalf of his wife during divorce proceedings. Clearly, she has been through mental anguish and should be compensated for her suffering. The rest of us, will just have to wait and hope that he resigns and moves to Oklahoma.