My Bio - Part 19

The Norwich Housing Authority (NHA) projects were arranged around a square courtyard, with four strips of apartments on each side. The courtyard doubled as a parking lot and a playground for the kids, though they would literally play everywhere, including on my roof! Each strip contained four apartments: some had two or three bedrooms, while mine had one and four-bedroom units. The two one-bedroom apartments were on the ends, and the two-story four-bedroom apartments were in the middle, extending partially over the one-bedrooms. That’s how the kids next door managed to get onto my roof—by climbing out of one of their bedroom windows.

When I first moved in, no one was home next door and the kids were at school, so it was fairly quiet, just as the manager had told Tammy. It wasn’t until later that I realized what a circus it truly was but I couldn’t blame Tammy for that. I knew she’d been misled, and if she’d known better, she wouldn’t have helped me move into the place.

The apartment itself was filthy and tiny. It was so small that I couldn’t fit all my furniture in it, so I threw an old table out back. The unruly kids quickly beat it into splinters. Setting up my waterbed in the shoebox of a bedroom was impossible, so I slept on a folding cushion that could either be a chair or a makeshift bed, though it wasn’t much wider than I was at the time. With my then 23-inch waist, that wasn’t very wide.

There was barely room to move through the living room, and the bathroom, with its rusty old footed tub and sink, didn’t even have a shower nozzle. Baths were my only option, and it was hard to wash my hair in the tub as long as it was.

After Tammy and Bill left, I was slow to unpack. I was more miserable than ever and hated the place. I remember sitting down among the boxes and crying for hours.

Then a phone rang. Was that mine? I wondered.

It was loud enough to hear, but softer than usual. I wondered if the ringer on my phone was broken. I picked it up, but my “hello” was met with a dial tone, while the softer ringing continued.

Next door, I suddenly realized. My God, could the walls be that thin?

They most certainly were, as I soon learned when the family next door came home.

Barbara, the mother of the 4 kids next to me, liked to act tough, while her husband Dave was more laid-back. Their kids were wild and obnoxious except for their one daughter, who often visited me. The boys, however, screamed at the tops of their lungs, bounced balls off the walls of my apartment, and trampled over my head. It drove me utterly batty.

It was like sharing a house with them, except I couldn’t see them—I could only hear every sound. I heard everything from the sliding of their kitchen chairs to the squawking of their parrot. The slamming of doors, the ringing of their phone, even cabinets closing as if they were in my own kitchen. I could hear their conversations, word for word, despite being half-deaf. I could even feel the vibrations of the kids two doors down running up and down their stairs.

I complained to Barbara several times, and while she tried to help at first, she eventually became frustrated and angry. I was getting angry, too. I complained to the manager, to Tammy, to my parents—anyone who would listen.

“Talk to management,” my dad said. “Parents are supposed to control their kids.”

“Yes, Dad, I know, but these walls are paper-thin. Even if there were just one civilized adult over there, I’d still hear everything. I can’t put all the blame on the parents or the kids.”

“I don’t think you’re a bad person,” Barbara told me later. “I just regret the complications.”

So did I.

Debbie, who lived in the strip to my left, started out friendly but eventually became just as gossipy as Barbara. I ended up hating both of them, prank-calling them while I lived there and even a few times after I moved out.

As the weather warmed up, I spent more time outside to escape the chaos. But being popular with the kids didn’t give me much space outdoors, either. They followed me everywhere. It made me question why I’d ever considered having a child of my own through artificial insemination, though I had indeed seriously thought about it.

Then I met Lori, who lived in the strip to my right, and Lyle, who lived next door to her. Lori was pretty, but I knew she was strictly into men.

Lyle told me about his friend Rick, who needed a lead singer for his band. Excited, I met Rick at a bar where his band was performing. Although they leaned more toward rock, I hoped to convince them to let me sing some country songs which I was best at.

After Lyle introduced me to Rick, I sang an old Linda Ronstadt song.

“You’ve got a damn good voice,” Rick told me, welcoming me to the band.

I was thrilled. Finally, I was in a band. But after meeting with them a few times, they decided to disband. My excitement deflated as quickly as it had built up. I began to wonder if I was in the wrong part of the country to make it in the music biz, or if it just wasn’t meant to be.

Being a night person in the projects was nearly impossible. I was only getting a few hours of sleep each night. I wished I could go to bed early like the kids next door to get a full eight hours, but I also wanted to stay up late when it was finally quiet and I could enjoy the peace and hear myself think. The early mornings were torture as the chaos started up again. Even earplugs and the radio were useless against the commotion next door. By the time they left for school and the parents for work, I was too wired to go back to sleep. Between the lack of sleep and smoking with asthma, I was both physically and mentally drained. My lungs were in worse condition than I ever thought possible, and sometimes I felt like I was suffocating.

Life in Norwich was harder than it had been in South Deerfield. The bus system was absurd, looping around the city in such a way that a short trip could take an hour. I felt trapped in a life I didn’t want and couldn’t escape.

Tammy and I both tried, without success, to quit smoking. Bill, who had quit years ago, was always nagging Tammy about it. I had tried hypnosis back in Springfield, but it only worked for a couple of days. The longest I had ever gone without a cigarette was a week, but that was because I was sick. I tried the patch and the gum—nothing worked.

Living close to Tammy and Bill was getting pretty nerve-wracking, though I wasn’t surprised. They were moody, serious, domineering, and often treated me like a child. I felt more and more like I was being taken advantage of as a babysitter. It wasn’t that I minded babysitting, or that Tammy wouldn’t do things for me in return, but she expected me to help her without ever asking if I was up for it. She didn’t even call before showing up with the girls, nor did she knock—she’d just use the spare key I gave her and let herself in. It didn’t matter if I was in the tub, on the phone, or trying to relax.

“Unless this place kills me, I’ll probably never decline to babysit,” I told her, “but why don’t you call first? Maybe I want to be left alone or just laze out with a good book.”

Tammy bristled. “After all I’ve done for you…”

I cut her off. “This isn’t a contest. I’m not competing with you. I just want you to remember that I’m your sister, not one of your daughters.”

Bill really pissed me off one night too. After one of my asthma attacks, he stopped at a store on the way home.

“Want anything?” he asked.

“Yeah, I’ll come in,” I replied.

On the way back, he said in an accusatory tone, “I know you got cigarettes.”

Well, well, I thought. Last night, he undressed me with his eyes when he and Tammy returned home tipsy from a party, and tonight he’s playing daddy with me.

“Yeah, so?” I snapped. “You can’t make someone quit smoking. They have to do it when they’re ready. Besides, I don’t have to explain or answer to you. You take care of you, and I’ll take care of me.”

I had lost touch with Jessie and Paula but stayed in contact with Kim, Bob, Fran, and Nervous.

My other significant memory during those four horrendous months at the NHA was meeting Ann Marie. I met her twice after reading her ad in a gay magazine, where she emphasized that she was feminine and wanted someone equally feminine. She wasn’t kidding—she was the most feminine lesbian I’d met. Ann Marie worked in the meat department of a grocery store and was a year older than me, at twenty-seven.

While she was good-looking—five-foot-four with a slim, firm body and long brown hair—I didn’t care for her personality. She couldn’t accept me for who I was, and I knew the fact that I didn’t drive, among other things, bothered her. I didn’t bother to contact her again after I moved.

On May 23rd, I called the cops on my neighbors because they were getting louder by the minute. The next morning, Barbara threatened to beat my ass.

“Why don’t you come over here and try it?” I challenged.

Sure enough, she stormed out of her apartment and started banging on my door.

Who are you kidding? I thought. You can’t take this woman on in your condition. You can’t even breathe. Wait until you can take in more than half a lungful of air before you set this bitch straight.

But I never got the chance. I collapsed on the living room floor instead. It was terrifying. I genuinely thought I was going to die that day. Struggling to stay conscious as I wheezed and gasped for air, I miraculously managed to pull myself up on all fours and crawl to the phone. Tugging at it by its cord, the phone clattered to the floor, and I somehow dialed 911. If my number and address hadn’t shown up on their system, I might not have been saved in time because I couldn’t even speak.

I barely remember the ambulance ride to the ER or being transferred to Natchaug Hospital in nearby Mansfield.

Natchaug’s co-ed adult psych ward was a stark contrast to the ones I had been in at Brattleboro and Valleyhead.

“Don’t worry,” the psychiatrist told me when I expressed concerns about being drugged up. “This is the nineties. Back in the eighties, drugs were a quick fix for problems. Now, that’s more of a last resort. Besides, you’re not crazy—you just need to move.”

But where would I go? And what kind of life would I have?

The ward I was in was much nicer and less strict than other places I had stayed in. The kitchen had more than just tea and air-popped popcorn; it had fruit, cereal, milk, coffee, and more. We could smoke anytime we wanted, though it had to be outdoors and not after 10:30 PM.

The rooms were like typical hospital rooms, with two people in a room and ordinary hospital beds. Each room had its own toilet and sink, while the showers were in a separate area by the nurses’ station.

I’m proud to say I stood up to my threatening roommate, too. I don’t remember what the argument was about, but when she threatened me, I said I was ready if she wanted to fight. She backed down, calling it silly, so I backed off too. Instead, I managed to run her out of the room, and I mostly had it to myself after that.

There was a guy named Bob in his forties who hadn’t spoken a word in about twenty years, likely due to some trauma. He functioned normally but only made strange “wind” sounds as if he were learning to whistle. Other than that, Bob was silent.

That is until I accidentally changed everything. One day, I was in the courtyard looking for a light for my cigarette, as we weren’t allowed matches or lighters. We had to get our smokes lit by the staff or other patients.

Bob, the only other person in the courtyard at the time, hurried over to light my cigarette with his. I could tell right away he liked me.

“Thanks, Bob.”

A handful of staff and patients joined us in the courtyard. We were all quiet for a few minutes, lost in our own thoughts. Then I softly began singing Desperado. Next thing I knew, a male voice had joined mine. It was Bob! Everyone was shocked. From that day forward, not only did Bob talk—he sang! No one could get him to shut up. I’m sure his family had mixed emotions about me getting him out of his shell like that.

I broached the subject of Arizona with my father again. He had driven the fourteen hundred miles from Florida in just two days after I was admitted to the hospital. I urged him to contact Andy, and he did.

“Act all surprised when your dad tells you about coming out here,” Andy told me. “He asked me to keep it a secret.”

But I was surprised. I needed to hear it from my dad first to believe it. I hoped Andy hadn’t misunderstood, though I doubted my father would call him if he weren’t serious. I tried not to get my hopes up.

Yet, I remembered how confident Dad sounded when I asked if we could find me a place within a few days. I called Tammy to see if she’d say anything about it. She didn’t, but she sounded different—calm. Unusually calm, considering calm was not one of Tammy’s usual traits.

Something was definitely up.

As usual, I had trouble sleeping at night, even with Benadryl. Getting up at 7:30 AM felt like dragging myself out of bed at 3:00 AM.

Although it wasn’t as structured as Valleyhead, there was still plenty of structure at Natchaug, along with too much group therapy and not enough one-on-one attention.

After my dad confirmed that I was going to Arizona, and after I recovered from the shock, I made a surprising announcement during group therapy. We were discussing our plans after discharge, and when it was my turn, I said, “I’m going to Phoenix, Arizona!” The group burst out laughing, thinking I was joking.

On June 1st, I went to stay at Tammy’s house until I left for Arizona on the 9th. Dad and Tammy had already packed up my belongings and shipped them to Andy’s studio, where I would spend my first few days. My furniture was taken to Tammy’s house and sold.

The reality of it all slowly began to sink in as one by one, my lifelines to the East Coast were shut down. I changed my address at the post office, closed my bank account, disconnected my phone, and transferred my benefits and probation. In Connecticut, I had managed to avoid payments and counseling for four months. But now, I was really moving to the Wild West—to the desert. To a place I had only dreamed of and seen in pictures or on TV. It was the final chapter of my life in New England as the last few connections I had there were unplugged.