Hi, All,
As some of you may know from my earlier posts, I rent a flat in the top part of a house, and the landlord lives downstairs. He doesn’t know anything about me, of course. It’s my business and nobody else’s, right?
Now I work at home on my computer, so there’s no reason I can’t get all dolled up in the morning if I feel like it before I get at it. Lots of days I do feel like it, and this morning was one of those times. I just pretend I’m a really smart-looking office girl.
I was working away at about 9 when suddenly my doorbell rang twice in quick succession. I ignored it. I could hardly go down in the state I was in. Then it rang three more times and that’s when I said, “Well, *****!” Because that could only mean one thing: the landlord had locked himself out.
He’s mid-seventies and fairly forgetful and he does lock himself out from time to time. And that’s not the worst of it. It’s happened at least three times that he starts to boil a roast or something and then leaves the house, forgetting to turn the cooker off. So all the water eventually boils away and the roast starts burning and filling the house with smoke. And there’s nothing I can do about it, because when he leaves the house, he always locks the kitchen, so I can’t get in. (I’ve always wondered why he locks it. I do respect his privacy, and I would never go in there for any reason except to save our home. I wonder what sort of valuables/illegal items he has stashed away in there.)
When he does leave something on the cooker, he’s generally not too far away. He’s a farmer and has land just outside of town, so if I smell smoke, I phone him and he’s always back within ten minutes. So we’ve never been burned out.
But I’ve been wondering what I’d do if he locked himself out when I was dressed. It’s not like I can just go down and let him in. And I’m certainly not inclined to change my clothes, remove all the make-up and fingernail polish—which would take me a while in any case. And above all, I’m not going to stop dressing just because he’s a senile old eejit. So what can I do? It was time to find out this morning.
At first, I just ignored the bell. I had no choice there, and it would serve him right to be locked out for a while. I was hoping maybe he’d just leave, thinking that I was probably gone and would be back later and meanwhile he could get a bit of work done on the farm or something. Fortunately, I hadn’t yet turned on my phone, so he couldn’t phone me to tell me to come down.
After about an hour, I knew I had to do something. He’d phone a buddy and the two of them would try to figure out a way to get in. Maybe they’d break in if they had to, and he wouldn’t be pleased to discover that I was in the house the whole time and didn’t let him in. If they were making a big racket, I couldn’t pretend I didn’t hear it.
So I was going to have to go down the stairs and leave the door slightly ajar. No danger in that. This is a safe neighbourhood and we wouldn’t have any intruders. Problem was, I couldn’t be sure that he’d gone. He might be sitting in his car outside the house, and how could I explain why I didn’t open the door earlier?
Well, nothing for it. That’s what I had to do, so I did it. Sneaked downstairs, then back up and locked my own door. And about ten seconds later, I heard his own doors opening and closing downstairs. For Pete’s sake, was he in the house all that time and I’d imagined the whole scenario?
So I turned my phone on and called him and he had in fact been locked out. And he was a bit puzzled to find the door ajar. Here I made a mistake. I told him I’d been out myself and mustn’t have closed the door firmly when I got back. He said, “I thought maybe the fairies came along and opened it. I was sure I pulled it to. You must have slipped in just ahead of me.”
I saw my mistake. He may have been sitting outside the house the whole time and never saw me come back because I hadn’t in fact come back. He must have been outside, because how else could he have been in the house within ten seconds? And right beside the door there’s a fairly big frosted-glass window that I couldn’t avoid. He may have actually seen me going to open the door.
I should have told him I was just out of bed. Sure, by then it was 10 o’clock, but in Ireland, there’s nothing outrageous about somebody in my circumstances being in bed that late, even on a weekday. It’s a slow-moving country. So I suspect that he suspects that there’s something fishy going on, but he hasn’t a clue what it is.
People, this situation is obviously no good. I’m going to suggest to him that he leave a spare key somewhere, out at the farm if nowhere else, on the grounds that “I’ve been in and out a lot lately.” But it’s something I’d like to avoid in future, and there’s really only one way to do that. As some members of this forum know, I’m very eager these days to come out of the closet. I’m trying to size things up, figure out a strategy for coming out in this little town I live in. I honestly don’t know how well that’s going to work.
But it would be helpful to be out to my landlord, even if I never set foot outside the house, precisely so we can avoid little incidents like this, which really are very, very stupid. I was thinking about sitting him down and having a friendly chat with him, something along these lines:
“It’s like this, you decrepit, old fool: I’ve decided I want to be a girl. You don’t really mind having a girl in the house, do you? Almost seven years I’ve been here now. That’s as long as Jacob agreed to work for Rachel and he still didn’t get her. But we’ve always got along fine, and think about it: have you ever got along with anyone else better than you have with me? You see, I do know a little something about your reputation in this town and county.
“Seven years, and I’ve never once made you wait for the rent or the electricity. I’m quiet and have never caused you any problems. I’ve never been very demanding about the upkeep of the flat, and let’s face it, it ain’t exactly Buckingham Palace, is it?
“And recently I’ve learned to my delight that I was mistaken about one very important point. There’s been legislation in recent times that I knew nothing about (I really should keep up with stuff like that) which is going to make it very hard for you to find legal grounds to put me out. Now if you want to go the illegal route, I’m quite sure that’s a battle you’ll win hands down. But if you get rid of me, are you going to find a better tenant? You know good and well you won’t. Why else have you left that basement flat empty all these years? It’s because you got sick of the types you always found to rent it to, isn’t it?
“And think about it: as long as I’m here, you’ve got a good sum of money coming in every month, regular as clockwork, that you never have to do doodly-squat for. You’ve got somebody to let you in when you stupidly lock yourself out, and what’s more, you’ve got someone to phone you when you even more stupidly try to burn the house down.
“So in view of all that, does a dress really bother you so much? . . . Oh, well, what if it’s a really pretty dress? . . . Oh, come on! I don’t look that bad! You haven’t even seen me!”
Best wishes, Annabelle
My name is Carol.
Originally Posted by Julogden
lol oh yeah i remember now, but what i would do is buy a fireproof container and put all of my pretty clothes, shoes and make up in it because i can't imagine trying to replace everything i have!
paula
