Scrambled

Jun 16, 2009 by Sloane Solomon

Each month, Sloane’s funny frankness echoes the experiences of young people and their choices.

Remember that children’s book called The Little Engine That Could? It was all about this sort of cute, semi-creepy looking, tiny blue engine that kept saying, “I think I can…I think I can…” From what I remember (which is not much) the engine was trying to get up a super steep hill made out of gumdrops or some other crappy candy and he thought he wasn’t strong enough to make it. But in the end, hooray! That little blue engine with the frightening clown conductor made it up the hill.

I just hit up Wikipedia to fact check my retelling and I was completely inaccurate about the entire plot, accept for the part about “I think I can.” But that one line of the book, dear readers, is where our story really begins.

I was worried, nay, terrified, that I wouldn’t be able to live on my own. Shower on my own. Cook on my own. Clean on my own. Perform as a fully functioning adult human being on my own. And OK, so maybe my shower needs a good scrubbing, and maybe I’m existing off beans and frozen bananas, and yeah maybe I haven’t Swiffered my floor in a month or two, but I’m doing it. I’m living on my own, and I’m loving it! Well, sort of loving it.

I told you the building I moved into is nothing but ex-hippies and Vietnam POW’s peeking out their windows all day long spying on the enemy. The enemy, I soon realized, is me. Whenever anything goes wrong in the building, from a cigarette butt on the pool floor, to a palm frond falling on someone’s car during the night, I get blamed for it. I assume I am number one on my landlord’s speed dial because I get a phone call from him just about every day.

“The last time I had a boy over at 2:30 a.m. was my pizza man.”

I’ve been in trouble for dumping my garbage in the garbage room after 8 p.m. but I only throw out my garbage in the morning. I’ve been blamed for broken glass on the pool deck yet I’ve never taken a glass bottle to the pool. I’ve been blamed for a giant Dell computer box left in the laundry room yet I would rather buy an abacus than spend money on a Dell.

And the final straw came a few days ago. My landlord calls me to basically tell me everyone on the first floor believes I am running an escort service out of my bedroom. He said various tenants have complained about me opening the front gate for “strange men” between the hours of 2:30 – 3:00 a.m. on a bi-weekly basis. I laughed hysterically at my landlord and said, “I wish my life was that exciting.” The last time I had a boy over at 2:30 a.m. was my pizza man. And not a sexy, porno pizza man with a strategically placed hole in the box. No, it was a little abuelito who didn’t even bring me my Diet Coke.

I’ve decided that I’m going to give my fellow tenants a show. I’m going to start parading around in red silk floor length bathrobes, high heeled Marabou slippers and bedazzled turbans. I’m going to hire men off Craigslist to carry me from my doorstep to my car on their shoulders, and you can bet I’m going to be holding a smashed glass contest pool side this weekend. Don’t think I can piss these old farts off anymore? I think I can…I think I can.

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