Life in the Land of Dreamy Dreams

The doorbell begins its annoying song, setting off a blur of dog tumbleweed racing through the house and smashing into the front door. The blinds chink and clink as the dogs attack them, looking for an opening to investigate who dared approach their domain.

“Alright, quiet girls!” I yell over the yowling. Still hoping against hope, I peer through the blinds.

“Heeeey,” Alfred calls, his standard greeting, grinning widely so as to best show off all four of his remaining teeth.

“Yeah, Alfred.” This is my standard greeting these days, delivered in flat tones while taking his measure. Looks like this could be a doozy. He’d made the extra effort and worn his eye patch over the empty left socket- a mixed blessing at best. He’ll expect to be paid a few dollars just for the courtesy. It made him look a pirate… ragged at the edges, certainly one who’d seen better days, but still out to plunder what he could.

Oh, and the neck brace. How nice for me- a double header. Ever since he’d been hit by a slow moving car a year ago the brace came and went according to whim. Since it was here today, he must be looking for a little sympathy cash on top of the eye patch bonus.

“I come to do some work. These leafs got to be taken care of. It looks bad.” He points to a single leaf that had fallen onto the sidewalk, his manner both proprietary and reproachful: How could you let my walkway sink to this state?

“Not today Alfred, I’m in the middle of…“

“You in a mood?” He eyed me critically, trying to calculate how far he could push today. “Hey, your pimple’s gone! God is good, see?” he said, buttering me up.

“Alfred, I don’t want to talk about that.” Every day for the last week, this had been high on the list of preferred topics of conversation. That and how I looked a little ‘puffy.’ It never ceases to amaze me that things and normal adults would never dream of mentioning- like the fundamental unfairness of someone my age getting a pimple- could be endlessly fascinating to Alfred.

“Looks good, that’s all I’m saying,” he says, hurt. “I don’t mean no harm, you know me.”

“Yeah, Alfred,” I reply, noncommittally. “I do know you. Look, I’m really busy, and besides, I don’t have any money, so-“

“Did I ask you for money?”

“Not yet.”

“I just come over to see what needs doin, didn’t say nothin’ about money.” He pouted and took off his hat, showing off his new hairdo. For someone so generally disheveled, he takes an amazing amount of pride in his hair, having something new to unveil every week or two. Last week’s trim afro had been reborn into dozens of tiny neatly spaced twists.

“Alfred, nobody expects you to work for free.” Shit. That was a misstep for sure. “Look- I’m mad at you about…”

“The cars, yeah, I know,” he said with some small chagrin. “But I’m here now,” he said, brightening.

“Not the point. You were paid do to wash the car and you just disappeared.”

“But I’ll do ‘em now!”

“I didn’t pay you on Monday to wash it on Thursday,” I gripe, wondering how my life had become a Popeye cartoon.

“But it was raining on Monday!”

“I paid you at ten AM- it didn’t rain until six.”

He grins. “Can’t blame me for tryin,’ can you?”

And therein lies the problem. He’ll never understand that I can blame him for it. In my previous life as a Yankee, if somebody was going to roll you for a few bucks at least they were quick about it, lest you change your mind.

But if Alfred didn’t at least pretend to work for it, he considered it charity. And he couldn’t abide charity, so we do this dance instead.

“He home?” Alfred asks, changing tactics. Maybe he’d get further with the man of the house.

“It’s 1:00,” I answer.

Alfred looks blank.

“On a Thursday afternoon.”

His expression is unchanged.

“He’s working!”

“Call him.” He looks away, fiddling with his neck brace, waiting for his command to be executed.
“Excuse me?” The tone made him look up, realizing he’d made a mistake along the way, even if he wasn’t quite sure what that might have been.

“Easy baby, easy. God is good. I don’t mean no harm. You don’t have to call him, I’ll just wait til he gets home.”

“No, you won’t. He’ll be back late, and you are not sitting out here all afternoon.”

“Well, gimme $8.00. I’ll wash the car.”

“I already paid you 10 to do it!” The big snap was coming on.

“When?”

“MONday!”

“You sure?”

“Quite.”

“Well, okay, if you’re sure,” he shrugs, magnanimous. “But I’m thirsty. Gimme a couple dollars for a colddrink.” Colddrink is local slang- all one word, it could mean anything from a water to a cold 40 from the corner store. In Alfred’s case it was almost certainly the latter.

“I told you I don’t have any money,” I say, knowing it’s all over.

I’d give him a handful of change, just to get it over with. And he’d leave, feeling he’d triumphed. Having not done any actual work, this strange pirate would make off with his meager booty, feeling good, despite the fact that he owned little more than what he stood up in, and he’d be going through this again in a couple of hours, with some other neighbor, to get a few more bucks together.

But that was later. For now he had won the money for his colddrink, and God was good.

---

I understand the neighborhood wisdom, that here was someone who’d been to jail, but was trying, in his way, and with his means, to do the right thing.Alfred’s idea of the right thing, however, involves much haggling, circular logic, doing his damnedest to get paid up front, and generally pushing his luck- it’s all a small time hustle and he still likes to feel like he’s got a hand in the game. He has a knack for staying away just long enough for you to cool off or forget how much you’ve already paid him. It’s not that he never does any work, it’s just that he never sees the need to get carried away with it.

Besides, the logic is that if everyone gave him a little something, he can’t get too carried away or word will get around and his little cash cow will dry up.

But, good Lord, it’s easier just to wash the damn car myself.

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