The building was three stories tall and had apartments on every floor except the street-facing part of the ground one, where there were businesses. I didn’t notice, then, that the ceiling was collapsing in the third-floor apartment that the realtor showed to me, my eyes going instead to the recently finished floors and the huge amount of closet space he pointed out, rather than the imperfections. This is the way it always is for me.
I walk into situations seeing only what others want to me to see. There is a certain sleight of hand that I have to be on guard for, which I seldom am. I trust until there is proof that trust is not deserved.
It puts me in a lot of situations I don’t care for, but what I would care for much less would be walking through the world with mistrust and prejudice. This is how it was when I moved to Cleveland, too. I had romanticized the Midwest, its crumbling buildings, its worn-down charm.
It reminded me of home, I thought and often said, home being Wilkes-Barre, PA, a failing, decaying coal mining town. The sun would come up over the Cuyahoga River, and I’d drive across the sun-gold expanse of the water, over the bridge with its solemn guardian statues, seeing smoke billowing from factory buildings, ruins in the morning mist. There was something beautiful about it, then.
Something that filled me with hope and joy. There were times that I thought I’d live there forever. There were times I thought I’d build community.
There were times when I b.
