MOVING OUT

In the Spring I moved out for the second time. The day before was a Sunday, windy and cold. My wife lay on a towel in the back yard, surrounded by a reflecting shield, determined to be the first in her group with a tan. The children, dressed in winter coats and long pants, played in left over snow that lay in the lee of the garage. They wore mittens with a long stand of yarn from one mitten, up the arm, across the back, into the armpit on the other side, and down the arm to the other mitten. When a mitten came off, the child appeared at her mother’s tanning bed for it to be placed on again.

I sat at the dining room table in an alcove that looked out at the back yard, writing thoughts on a yellow legal tablet. The thoughts were dark and incomplete, and when I ran out of reasons, I called a former client who was rehabilitating old houses in mid-town St. Louis to ask if he would rent me an apartment for free if I helped him manage the apartments and forgave thousands of dollars he owed me in legal fees.

Fortunately, Jimmy said he would consider it and we agreed to meet the next day at one of his rehabilitated properties. For several years Jimmy had needed a great deal of legal assistance but was unable to pay. He had a series of wonderful excuses, but he was a nice guy, and I continued to help him. He showed me an apartment in an old row house. He had stripped the old plaster to expose the soft red brick and installed wiring and plumbing to meet code standards. He put new black tile on the floors and opened up the fireplace in every room.

"It's a lovely place," he kept saying. "And you know how much everything costs. I'm going broke."

Jimmy hoped up to the last moment that I would release some cash into his enormous capacity for spending it. He was a fine fellow and a splendid talker, and we were friends, but Jimmy was never going to pay his legal bill, and a free apartment was almost like asking for cash.

Finally the tour was over, and Jimmy handed over the keys and left. I walked alone through the four rooms of the apartment trying to imagine what it would be like to live in those rooms. I imagined putting the big trestle table from my law office in the dining room with the two captain’s chairs and unpainted bookcases and a rocking chair in the living room.

I walked into the kitchen and closed the door of the refrigerator and plugged it in. Remember to call the electric company right away, I thought. Undoubtedly Jimmy is behind in his payments. I turned on the water in the kitchen sink and let it run until the rust left the water. Then I scrubbed the bottom of the sink with my hand. When I rubbed my wet hand across the top of the counter it left a clean streak, so I wet my handkerchief and cleaned the whole counter, rinsed the handkerchief and waved it in the air to dry. I tried to put it back in my pocket, but it balled up and wet through the pocket lining. Finally I folded the handkerchief over a towel rack. It looked good there. This was going to be my home.