Sweat Your Life into Tiny Buckets

It was time to take care of the COL- CHICINE in my system.

So I jumped out of bed, put on my slacks, slippers, pullover and a roll of toilet paper and left my room, heading down the hallway to the nearest bathroom. On the way there a door across the hall in front of me opens up and one of Paula's old crows steps out of her room wearing rollers in her hair, a night gown and slippers. In her hand was a roll of TP.

When she looked up bleary eyed, she noticed me and ducked back into her room, closing the door. Now what is wrong with this picture?? When did you think that your room extended into the public hallway? Its funny, because they act like the hallway is an extension of their rooms, entertaining guests in the corridor, talking loud, being generally a nuisance, and now, they have the nerve to walk around the public areas of the SRO, half dressed, scaring the shit out of people. What if I did that? Come strolling out of my room wearing nothing but my skivvies?

But that's just part and parcel of the flawed thinking of the Skek. Skeksies, even when you take them out of the street and put them into a gorgeous home like the ones we live in, always live in a state of entitlement. This and all things are given to them, so why should they show appreciation? Their lack of intelligence causes them to draw others of their ilk, bringing a bad element into their vicinity due to poor judgment skills. This bad element brings along unnecessary trouble and hardships, only because they don't think. Their thinking processes are so flawed it's pathetic.

Some have no clue between right and wrong, up or down, left or right. They seem to move in one direction until something stops them or causes them to change course, be that another person, object or the law. They live in a world of total entitlement, total carefree ambivalence. They couldn't care less about you or yours. Their sociopathic behavior is clearly evident in how everything centers entirely on them. They are the ones making noise at two in the morning, fighting with the cops and each other, taking more than their fair share of things being given out. Completely selfish creatures with black hearts and dirty hands.

I wish I could develop a virus that would infect them all, and put an end to them by the millions. I'm sorry, but we would be losing out on nothing in life without a one of them.

The buzzer in my room goes off. Now what? I press the talk button: "Roberto wants to see you," comes squawking from the little speaker. I'll be right down. SHIT! What is this about now? I get dressed and head downstairs to the office. Slick O answers the door, "Well, what's up, Hobobob!" he says, genuinely happy to see me. He shakes my hand. I start to worry now. "Dude, you're losing weight and looking healthier now. Wow, how are you, you look great??!!" If I could blush I would have. C'mon Slick O, you say that to all the homeless people! I ask were Roberto is. "Dunno, but I'm sure he'll be right back, come on in and take a seat!"

I cop a squat, and after waiting ten minutes I march off to Duane Reade and pick up my prescriptions and TP and return to find Roberto standing in the office waiting for me with his usual, non-jovial self. "Here, Hobobob," he says sourly. "I need for you to sign some papers." I follow him to a long desk, arrayed with hundreds of sorted papers. We walk down the row of papers until he finds mine. He points. "Three places on this one." I sign at the X's. "That's it," he says. That's it? "That's it." Wow.

Was that supposed to be a snap quiz from life this morning? I take ahold of the paperwork for my Fair Hearing and read the directions. Take the 2 or 3 to Borough Hall. That's it. 14 Boerum Place. So I go take the Way there and wouldn't you know it, but the Borough Hall exit drops you plop center into a promenade area amidst a bunch of court buildings, each with different names and numbers, but none reading Boerum Place. So I walk into one of them and approach it's Checkpoint Charlie. Suddenly the officers around the metal detector spring to life, one of their number cutting me off. "Can I help you?" Yeah, sure. I'm looking for 14 Boerum Place. He gives me directions outside of the court complex, and past the Brooklyn Law School. No shit. I would NEVER have found that shit.

14 Boerum Place, not far from the Mines of Moria, a Dark Tower filled with Orc-ish minions herding Orcs and other crawling things about like cattle. I go through two Checkpoint Charlie's easily by not carrying anything metal from home except my door key. On the 14th floor I find the waiting area where I sit for the Judge to come and hear my case. I'm patient, I read. Suddenly a raving woman takes center stage, complaining that this is her second time here for no reason, and that she had to give up something unbeliev- able to come here and wait on a judge. This Skek gets increasingly more belligerent and louder with the thin air until the police officers converged upon her and threatened her with expulsion from the building if she didn't sit down and grow silent. She clammed up but good, but did not sit down. Rather she paced about, mumbling to herself about calling everyone's boss to report every officer.

Her stupid antics was true entertainment, and before I knew it my name was called. A thin man, with graying hair slightly older than me by five or six years in a well pressed suit, led me into a room jam packed with paperwork and a court reporter. They introduce themselves. He was the judge.

"So your case has been closed?" He begins. No sir, my case is still.... "This reads that your case is still open. Why did you request a Fair Hearing online?" I show him all of the paperwork that Social Services gave me along with the WECARE letter. I thought that the confusing codes and arcane verbiage from the Social Services printout would be as confusing to him as it was to me but he read the hieroglyphics with ease. "This is wrong. He has two dates here for the NOI," he hands the papers over to the court reporter. "That means verbal notice right?" She nods. "Verbal notice," she agrees. The judge scribbles in a folder. "You are to be served notice that if you don't make your WECARE appointment, your case will be turned over for termination. You must make this appointment," the judge says to the paperwork that he is scribbling on. I wanted to tell him that I was already going to the WECARE appointments. "You will get a notice of this decision in the mail Mr. Hobobob. Your case is still open. You may leave." Is that it? "That's it. Make certain that you go to your appointment or you will be back here again." All of six minutes. It took longer taking the fucking Way down here than the actual court case.

And that was it. I got my carfare in a metrocard and took the Way back home. Which was once again, my home. I stood in the center of my room. It wasn't much, but it was all I needed right now. As Charles Bukowski said in his poem..HOW TO BE A GREAT WRITER:

...and remember the old dogs
who fought so well:
Hemmingway, Celine, Dostoevsky, Hamsun
If you think they didn't go crazy
in tiny rooms
just like you're doing now

without women
without food
without hope
then you're not ready.

drink more beer.
there's time.
and if there's not
that's all right
too


Hobobob