embedded in the floating world
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nmazca.blog embedded in the floating world |
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It was about 10 minutes past noon (or almost 11:11, in standard time) and I had just gone online to check some mail and send queries about some jobs. I had just changed the computer's clock, also, if you're wondering how I knew the exact time. Anyhow, I sat here and perused the morning's stats when I thought I heard a soft knock on the door. It seemed so soft that I thought it might have been someone at the door across the hall. So I stopped typing and listened. Someone was on the other side, and I heard what seemed to be the person putting something on the door. I also heard keys and an attempt to unlock the door (I thought). I didn't feel the need to get up, and so I went back to typing and waited for who I thought was the building manager to open the door with the electricity bill. The door sounds stopped. And then I heard the stairwell door open and descending footsteps. Here, I'll mention that the building manager lives downstairs. The stairwell door opened again, and there was more sound at the door... and I thought the manager was writing a note against the wood or affixing something to the door. I'd gotten up at that point and walked a few steps toward the door, paused, and then the activity stopped and the stairwell door opened again. I sat back down at the computer. Not 30 seconds later, I heard someone pushing on the window directly opposite the wall that separates the main studio room from what my Lady Friend and I call "the dining hall." This window is about 10 feet away from where I sat, in the corner of the apartment -- this apartment being in the rear, SW corner of the building, facing a blocked alley. The window is about seven feet above the ground, but the wall that divides the alley from the rear walkway to the building next door comes off of our corner of the building. It's on a perpendicular to the window, and, it seems, it rises high enough for someone to climb on its wooden slats and grab at the window frame. And it was unlocked (from feeding the sparrows three or four days ago). So I hear this scratching and shifting, and then the large, brass bell that's tied to the window lock began to ring, which meant that the window was being raised. I hear stuff tumbling off the sill, I get up and walk into the kitchen, and there's someone head and neck and arm into the window. My first question to him was: "What are you doing?" "Oh my god...!" he exhaled as he pulled back. His eyes were a bit bugged, and I think that they'd've been that way normally (you know, in other cases when that person wasn't being encountered by someone whose window he was climbing into in the middle of the day). He was black, maybe 25 (or younger, since people think I'm that age), wearing a blue nylon jacket and a blue bandana (which I think now, in contrast to my report, was a tight-fitting hat). I think it was th sort-of scraggly sideburns and moustache, and, as I was saying before, the eyes that let me know that he was desperate for something. The responding officer asked me if he seemed like a homeless person, and I said "Perhaps." He didn't seem anywhere near as twitchy or tweaked as a wandering crackhead, but "addict" was the first thing that went through my head when I walked into the kitchen, before I spoke. Anyhow, I can't recall what he said right after his exclamation of surprise. I remember "I've got the wrong apartment! Is Richard's apartment next door?" as he withdrew his head from the window and went back down the wall. "...No. I have no idea (remembering that there's just one woman who lives across the hall)... You have to go." By now he was on the ground again, and I was picking up the container of basil seedlings that he'd knocked onto the floor. "Damn, that was scary. Fuck...!" he exhaled as he walked back up the alley, toward the work crew truck that was parked near the dumpsters. I was only half paying attention to him at that point, because as I closed the window I saw an iridescent green hummingbird floating in the space between the wooden slats and the brick of the wall the guy had just climbed. I almost completely forgot about this whole other incident (for a few moments) and marveled at being within arm's reach of such a fantastic little creature. And then it flew away. I scooped up the moist soil on the floor and then I called the police. After that conversation, I walked back to the door, opened it, and saw that the noise had been this guy trying to pry past the bolts (If it had been the place I'd lived in Wallingford last year, then he wouldn't have had any trouble). This had me wondering how he got into the building at all, since you have to have a key to enter the front door and there were very few people around because of the hour. I firm knock came a few minutes later, and this tall, female officer greeted me, standing seemingly higher than the door frame. At this point, I recalled my waking dream from not two hours earlier, in which I was being pulled away by someone (a security guard, dressed in drab blue), I tripped and pinned him, and as he threatened to call the police, I said "Fine, call the police, I'll tell them that I was defending myself." I pointed out the door marks to her, and she was like "So he came in through the door?!" "No, I think he tried the door and then he came in through the window. I didn't see the door until after he left." She looked over the window and the adjoining wall and radioed to her partner who was still cruising (on a bike, also, since she laid her helmet to rest on the kitchen floor?). I gave the same ID that I gave to the dispatcher, and she asked if I'd be able to pick this person out if I saw him again. "Oh, yeah." We talked a bit more about how he might've gotten into the building, and then she gave me her card and left. I called my Lady Friend, who was incredulous that the first thing I said was "What are you doing?" and then I went to talk to the building manager. He told me that he'd been outside talking to the guys on the work crew (they're doing something next door) when the officer rolled up, and he let her in. He said that this was the first incident of any kind in two years, before which time there had been tenants telling him about people coming over that wall... and some of his and his wife's clothes had been stolen from the garage that's on the northern side of the building when they first moved in. He also told me that the gentleman who lives in the first apartment past the front door had been burglarized awhile back, but he'd never reported it and only told the manager after some time. This seemed really peculiar to him, that people would have experiences like that in the building, but not tell that management or anyone else. So I'll be sliding notes and knocking on doors on the floor, and that's the end of my story. Except to say that it might've been very different if I'd gone to the library to check my email instead of doing my virtual morning routine. And, aside from the "I'm home" surprise, perhaps there was a mirroring experience for the intended thief. Who can say? I got my things together to finally go to the library, but not before lighting a wand of sage, placing in the large kitchen window (all of them are locked now), and asking for protection and real, sustaining satisfaction to be imparted to all people. 05-137257 |
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