He was almost right. They also threw in some hearts and livers.
I thought I’d never fall asleep last night. My foot was throbbing. The Rescue Mission gives crutches to people who are temporarily handicapped on the condition that you return them later, so I went with Margaret and got a pair. Then I tied them to my bike handles and rode to the library. Crutches are a real drag, but I like having people open doors for me.
February 9, 1982
Raleigh
My burning penis is not syphilis or gonorrhea but just some kind of bladder infection. That’s the good news. The bad is that they’ve finally cut off my gas. I haven’t paid the bill since May, yet still the total is only $30. Added to that is a $15 reconnection fee.
My grandfather Leonard was like that, like me. He would avoid bills and loan what money he had to friends. Mom grew up having her father wander home drunk and broke. I’m not drunk or generous, just broke.
February 10, 1982
Raleigh
After a four-day weekend I returned to work and was hit on the head by a brick. I was under a house, lying on my back and stapling insulation to the floor joists above me. The brick was loose and it landed on my eyebrow, taking a number of hairs and leaving a lump, which I sort of like because it makes me look tough.
In the afternoon I helped a guy named Pat carry furniture. It annoys me when someone assumes he’s stronger than me and calls for a third set of hands to help. I am not a physically weak person, just uncoordinated. Pat is a real chatterbox. While moving stuff, I learned:
He has nine brothers and sisters.
He is from Wisconsin.
Once he had a rod stuck up his penis to search for scar tissue.
He got married in Rhode Island in 1973.
He went to Vietnam.
He refinished his own dresser.
He has a thirty-four-inch waist.
He once found a pie safe in a Carrboro mechanic’s shop.
He subscribes to Workshop magazine.
He bought his stereo in 1969.
Meanwhile, Charles has been fired. His replacement is a guy named Tommy. Tommy is Dougie’s cousin and frequently talks about “gnawing on some pussy.”
That sounds pretty severe, to gnaw on it. Tommy’s sister is a lesbian. She’s straightforward about it, and when she brings her girlfriends home to meet the family, Tommy’s father kisses them on the mouth, hoping, his son says, “to get the sweet taste of pussy on his lips.”
With T.W. gone, there hasn’t been much sex talk on the job site. That’s changed now. I listen but never speak.
Driving home from Greek class, we passed a weaving drunk on the street. “That man lives in my apartment complex and once asked me to go with him to Charades Lounge for a drink,” Lisa told me. She lit a cigarette. “I would have gone if I’d known for certain that he was going to pay.”
February 11, 1982
Raleigh
Mrs. Ewing was at home this afternoon. She works as a maid for a car dealer and his insurance-selling wife. Her daughter-in-law chose the paint for the exterior of the house and luckily she likes it. “Now, I’m a lady and I like lady colors,” she said. “I like me some pink and yellow.” Mrs. Ewing begins stories with the line “You won’t believe this, but one time…”
Her son was in Vietnam and has had several nervous breakdowns since returning home. “It’s hard for him to find a job once they learn he’s been in a nerve center,” she said. Again today when it was time for her to leave, she said, “I’m gone.” And she was.
February 12, 1982
Raleigh
Charlie Gaddy was at the IHOP, causing heads to turn. He is the anchorman on Eyewitness News and a local celebrity. At the restaurant, one woman after another stepped over to say hello. One asked which syrup he preferred, and he said, “In my opinion, the blueberry is best.”
Tomorrow S. and I are going shopping in Chapel Hill. I want to find a good birthday gift for Mom and am willing to spend $20. She’s been a very good mother this year, so I’m looking for a German-made windup mouse. That would be the perfect gift.
I worked today with a black man named Charles T. who backed into a Southern Bell van as we were leaving Capital City Truck Rental in our huge flatbed. Charles T. can’t make out a word white people say. After he asked “What?” fifteen times, I started talking like him and he understood.
Charles T. plays cards in a one-story brick house behind the landfill. Last week he lost $400. We passed the Wakefield Apartments, and he pointed to a unit and told me that a few days ago, two brothers lost $9,000 gambling there. “The key to life is knowing when to stop,” he said. Then noon came, and he stopped working and left. Off to play cards, I guess.
February 14, 1982
Raleigh
Last night Dad came to visit. He walked in without knocking and went straight to my bed and lay down on it. Then he closed his eyes and was out for quite a while. Again he’d waited until the last minute to buy Mom a Valentine’s gift. Before leaving, he looked around my living room and kitchen. Then he said, “Well, aren’t we domestic.”
After reaching the sidewalk he returned and asked if my apartment was always this warm. Then he left again and returned again to ask if the building heats with gas or oil.
When I was in high school, Dad would sometimes come into my room and lie on my bed. Sometimes he’d talk, but most often he was silent.
February 15, 1982
Raleigh
New word: bourgeois, meaning pussy. Tommy says he’s glad he’s married and can get all the bourgeois he needs and don’t have to choke the chicken like single men do. He talks a lot about kicking his wife’s ass. He’ll kick her ass clean across the room if she doesn’t have supper ready when he gets home. He’ll kick her ass if she won’t give him bourgeois when he needs it. Today he wore a T-shirt with ANIMAL written on it. The thing about Tommy is that he’s more than a little ugly, especially compared to Bobby, who’s compact and cute. Tommy and Dougie and Bobby talk about Misty and Debbie and Jackie. They treat me with a kind of detached, patronizing humor that probably should bother me but doesn’t.
Last night I went crazy for marijuana. I was Jack Lemmon tearing up the greenhouse in Days of Wine and Roses. I looked for (and found) pot in the folds of album covers I had used to deseed long-ago ounces and quarters. I found some under the sofa cushions. Then I pulled out the couch and looked under the radiator. I turned the place inside out and got a little stoned but not much.
February 16, 1982
Raleigh
Tommy’s wife cooked chicken and rice, so he didn’t have to beat her ass last night. It was right there on the table when he got home. He uses the word nigger loudly and freely in that neighborhood, and it annoys me because we are guests there. What if Mrs. Ewing heard him? She’d be so hurt.
February 17, 1982