Tales From A Broad

by Fran Lebowitz

  There are two problems: I don’t want to go back to Singapore any more, and we haven’t found a renter yet. Perhaps that is one problem and one solution? Not a chance. I have to go. Frank has to go. We’re a family. He never would have made this decision had I not complained so. How was he to know that when I said ‘My job is killing me; I never see the kids’ I meant, ‘Oh, wait a second, I’m alive again. What’s to see? They’re kids.’

  And anyway, they’ve already lined up a new agent to take my office.

  My heart tightens as I imagine tenants in our living room, sitting by the fire where, after putting the kids to bed, Frank and I would play Trivial Pursuit and eat Chee Whiz on crackers and body parts. Suddenly the house symbolises my life and I know I don’t want to leave. I mean, what the hell was I thinking when I decided to stay on in Singapore? I’m a New York literary agent. This is my home.

  Our house is on the edge of a nature preserve. The deck where I constantly seek refuge is just off the living room and looks out over a large forest. Before we moved in, there was just one tiny window in the corner of the room. We knocked out a wall, put in huge sliding doors, built the deck and made a fantastic place to watch the seasons change, from inside and out. (Which reminds me, there are no seasons in Singapore. They think they have two – rainy and not so rainy – but they don’t. They are lying.)

  There is a catwalk library off the master bedroom, which also has a great view of the trees. I set up a desk there and used to look at the woods as I worked. The built-in shelves were lined with all the books I loved and those I couldn’t wait to read. We had two fireplaces. The problems with the house became fewer as we poured thought, money and man-hours into it. We had a cool house and in it we brought new people to the planet.

  George Groves is the best realtor on the face of the earth. We found him when I was pregnant and we decided to move to Westchester. He showed us – literally – 200 houses. He was never vague. He was never fatigued. He never seemed annoyed that we just didn’t get it: we were too poor to be rich. He never tried to sell. He would point out the good, the bad, the fixable, the ‘whys’ and ‘why nots’. He didn’t just drive us to a site and drone, ‘Here’s the bedroom … Here’s the kitchen.’ Not our George. He saw me get larger and larger with Sadie, and I heard all about his life. My mother-in-law joined me on many of these house hunts and he responded to her challenging questions with unwavering calm and educated answers. When we finally bought our house, he remembered – from almost a year before – that we had said we wanted ‘funky’. He also thought to comment, ‘You realise you are 500 yards from your mother-in-law?’

  So when George says, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll get you a renter,’ I know I shouldn’t be so nervous. The clock is ticking, but just as the alarm is about to go off, a wonderful grown-up family fall for the place, the deck, the nature, the kitchen and library.

  I like her, the wife, in particular. She’s warm and effusive. She doesn’t ask things like, ‘How old is the drier?’ Instead, she asks, ‘What will it be like for your kids in Singapore?’ She tells me all about her kids and her sister’s kids, and unabashedly gushes over things I did to the house.

  I guess that’s why I choose to ignore the, um, import of all those ‘must do’s’ right there on her personage. She has buttons missing, resident stains on her slacks and a way-past-due-date on her roots. She’s the sort of person who would marvel at a crater in the ceiling of her own bedroom if she noticed it at all, and, if it rained, she’d just put a hand over her head. But she would love our forest.

  The deal is signed. The tenants move in, the kids and I move over to the in-laws. Frank goes to Singapore to get stuff sorted out. I go to daycare, work, and the grocery store. By eight at night, I have the kids in bed. Sometimes Frank and I talk on the phone, but, given the fact that one of us is just waking up and one of us is ensconced in happy hour, we’re forever struggling to find a common mood. Emails are safer.

  When it is time for me to go to the book fair in Germany, Frank returns to New York victorious. We have a fantastic apartment ready and waiting back in Fortune Gardens – two floors, a sea view from every window, the works. He swings me around the room. Thrilled for me.

  I hand over the diaper bag and head off to Frankfurt. For the first time in a long time, I am without kids, doing my job, being on, partying without my husband. I am getting a great workout from kicking myself about the whole Singapore situation. I don’t want to go. I belong here. (Well, not exactly here in Germany, oy …) But then I lose the videotape. The one that has the words ‘DO NOT LET OUT OF YOUR SIGHT’ written all over it. The one that, if ever seen by anyone but authorised individuals in a secure environment, will mean thousands of lives at risk – or at least a couple of people out of a job. I have no idea where I left the almost final edited copy of Lost in Space but my plane is leaving in one hour without it. I call people in their hotel rooms from the plane so many times they answer their phones with ‘No, it hasn’t turned up’.

  When I land and Frank meets me at the airport, I vomit.

  ‘I lost Dave’s video … I left it at someone’s booth … it’s gone … I’m dead … he’s dead … we’re all dead, dead, dead … killed and dead … (vomit).’

  And then Frank reminds me. ‘They’ll have to find you first!’

  The next day, just before we board the plane for Singapore, the video is reported to be in safe hands and on its way to my New York office. I kiss the phone. I never tell the client. I go joyfully to my seat in business class and snap for champagne … and keep them coming … For the next three years, they’ll have to find me first. Goodbye, New York!

  Frank gets all his merit badges at once when he shows us into our new apartment. We have ample storage, large rooms and huge balconies, and every window in the entire joint has an unobstructed sea view. And, we have carpeting. This may not seem worth mentioning but it is rare here. No more crawling around with the kids on a cold, hard, marble floor. If that’s the icing on the cake, then the cherry on top is Sadie’s pink bedroom and the pink velvet headboard over her queen-sized bed.

  Frank is all aglow as the three of us cheer and hug him. ‘Hooray for Daddy!’ We dance. He can’t hide his pride and relief. He shows us around every nook and cranny and gives us a tour of all the wonderful features in our new home. He has taken it upon himself to purchase things we need, like a microwave, toaster oven and blender. He has had phone jacks installed on the balcony so I can work at night, watching the ships’ lights, and, when it’s clear, see Indonesia twinkling in the distance. We have remote-controlled lights, airconditioners, ceiling fans, boom boxes and VCRs. The place is filled with cables and thin little palm-held devices that are the only way to turn everything from the overhead light to the coffee maker on and off. Forget where you put one of these remote control suckers and you’re screwed. What the heck is wrong with a toggle switch? I guess the marketing people are sure that the only way to edge past the competition is to appeal to the paraplegic and terribly lazy.

  After the ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’ I’m faced with brochure overload. I flick through dossier after dossier about the stuff that is to make our lives easier. Ninety-eight pages of text come with the microwave; 160 pages come with the sound system. I decide to tackle it room by room, and start with the kitchen. I flip through the microwave book. The convivial little introduction starts with ‘Welcome To Your Breezy New Lifestyle’. I get bored after the diagram of the appliance broken down into pieces labelled AA–ZZ. I just pull the microwave and all the accessories out, tossing styrofoam peanuts around and ripping through bubble wrap (saving enough so the kids will have a new toy tomorrow). Frank is watching me with that enormous – but now starting to get on my nerves – grin on his face. It must hurt to have it like that for so long. His eyes are moist when he points and says, ‘This one came with a mirror. Special promotion.’

  I give him a sceptical look. This isn’t Frank; it’s Ernest. I move on to the blender and in that box there is a Fil
ofax. Frank is still over the moon.

  ‘Special promotion?’ I ask. Frank’s head goes up and down in the enthusiastic affirmative.

  I’m not unhappy about these little extras but I am confounded by their relevance. I mean, I can understand the whole ‘But wait … there’s more! If you order now …’ thing. But there was always a correlation between the freebie and the product, something that would, say, enhance your cooking experience. But a full-length mirror with my microwave? A Filofax with a blender? Hey, I just checked my schedule, no time to chew, better get out the blender – ha ha.

  They have a totally different idea of marketing over here. They think it’s sheer brilliance to have slogans like: ‘Make it a Hock Toey night!’ or ‘Buy Chow Wang and you’ll never go back!’ The guys who thought up these bon mots are probably promoted to Grand Poo Bahs of their agencies. ‘Yu Xin, you are like tiger,’ says Goh. ‘These ads are the lizard’s gizzards. They do “the bump”.’

  I don’t want to get sardonic so soon after landing, after seeing how happy my new husband Ernest is, after committing to three more years. I tell myself to shut up and enjoy. I assemble my mirror in the kitchen, position the microwave on the counter and watch myself nuke. I look pretty good. I get so far into it that I even think, ‘Gee, if I get two, I’ll look twice as good and nuke up twice as much.’

  After a while, Frank finally leaves to check in at the office. We only landed yesterday and life feels out of focus for me, like I’m acting it out but missing my cues. I get tired of pulling boxes apart and trying to catch those wily little grains of styrofoam. I grow weary of figuring out where to put things and identifying their usefulness. Even dreaming of sweeping through my home in a white silk gown with rabbitfur cuffs, flipping stuff on and off, fails to thrill after a while.

  But I’m determined to make the place homey and get rid of the boxes. For something different, I turn my back on the new gizmos, begin hacking away at the containers sent from home, and start taking things out, beholding them as if for the first time. ‘Oh, I remember this potato peeler … Yes! I am so glad I didn’t leave the masking tape behind …’ And then, as I line it all up, growing soft and nostalgic, I see the little bonus: every bowl, fork, knife, spoon, masher, peeler, grater, candlestick, cheeseboard, piece of linen, towel, toy, book and CD is covered not only in old grease and old crud but also carpets of brand new mildew. I open a box marked ‘Sadie’s Toy Chest’ and scream. A dozen dolls stare up at me. These are not the faces of innocent childhood playthings. Each lovingly named, cherished, treasured doll, from the American Girls to the Barbies, has turned sickeningly mottled – as if painted for jungle warfare, or worse – with mildew. I can only see the whites of their eyes. Evil is in that box. I kick it over. Their chanting dies down, but the magic eight ball rolls out, telling me: ‘Whatever you think, is right.’

  It will take forever to get all this stuff cleaned. I see my bunny fur balding and my silk greet-your-husband dress stained and smelly. I see my rhinestone heels getting caught up in a herd of rusty Brillo pads. I see my breezy new lifestyle turn skeezy. I must attack this mess … I must attack this mess … I walk steadily, slowly. My eyes are unblinking as I advance, chisel in hand, poised at ear level, ready to chip away at a five-month-old blob of guacamole or fossilised noodle – or maybe I’ll just maim Baby All Gone.

  ‘Why you brought so much?’ comes a voice from the living room.

  ‘Pearl!’ I cry. ‘How did you …’

  ‘Ah, we begin again,’ she says.

  She opens several bags filled with household cleansers and pulls a chisel out of her hip pocket. We both watch it gleam in the light for a moment.

  Taking hold of myself, I ask, ‘What about that family from Texas?’

  ‘So cheap, lah. They got maid now, Filipino. Here my new card.’

  Her rates now include unpacking expats – $400 a day. I look around the room, thinking about it for a minute. If I say ‘Forget it’, she’ll disappear again, but if I take it, she’ll keep appearing again. I look around the room and shell out $500.

  ‘Keep the change, just stay with me for the day.’

  I take a bath with the kids and share their dismay and disappointment that bubble bath doesn’t work here. How can that be, you wonder? Because there is no water pressure. It took seven hours to get two inches of lukewarm water. Still, we feel better. After the bath, the kids sit in their car seats in the hall and we pretend they’re still on the plane. ‘Have a nice flight!’ I call out.

  ‘Mommy, don’t go!’

  ‘Have to, sweetie, but the stewardess will come around.’

  ‘Mommy!’

  ‘We’re just playing. You aren’t on a plane. I have tons to do around the house. Now have a nice flight.’

  Finally, I set about making the home a home, for Sadie, Huxley, Frank and me. A place where we will play and grow and laugh and tickle and … and that’s when ‘The Night Chicago Died’ comes to Fortune Gardens. I’m shocked out of total recall. I can’t remember all the details – just like I can’t remember the seconds before I hit a car full of Hassidim in Baltimore. I only remember their yarmulkes dangling at unnatural angles. It was horrible, there were bobby pins everywhere. There wasn’t a dent on their car, but their headgear had gone astray. I was shamed. And I call myself a Jew! I stepped out of my car with some difficulty since I was nine months pregnant. The officer told me I had an expired licence. The men said, ‘God forbid, she should keep driving that … that … weapon, going around killing innocent people.’ I rubbed my stomach. The officer took my keys away. The men took my insurance premium.

  Back to this crash … Okay, I remember I plugged in the wedding-gift cappuccino machine. I was eager to get Huxley’s room ready for him for his nap so I plugged in his fish tank. I plugged in the 200-year-old-from-Rittman-to-Rittman china lamps after placing them on overturned boxes I had lovingly draped with colourful matching batiks. I started to charge up Frank’s electric shaver and tested the printer and tried sending a fax to my mom and playing some old albums on the stereo, but I didn’t get far. The hissing and burning and popping, the sizzling and frying and sparking. Glass flying, plastic melting, coffee everywhere … it all happened so fast.

  So it would seem Singapore is on a different power system. Most profoundly retarded people know this.

  Frank walks in the door. The studio audience gives him rousing applause. They elbow one another knowingly. ‘Now the jokes are coming,’ they say.

  After a beat, Frank gives the camera a look. I remove his shoes. I hand him his drink. I’m over-solicitous, anticipating his every need, the perfect wife with a big old boo boo that has to be ’splained. I promise him his favourite thing in the whole world if he promises not to yell. There’s grousing, nervous pacing, aye carumbas. The best I can hope for is an endearing tone when he shouts out ‘Whah was chew thinnin’ about?’ because I just destroyed about $3,000 worth of appliances and whatnot we brought from America. And I seem to have caused some electrical damage in the apartment because nothing works now.

  ‘All I wanted to do was have you come home to a nice place. Wah, wah, wah.’

  Ah, what’s going to happen next? Pearl! She looks up and smiles and flicks the switch on our $800 vacuum cleaner. Flash, boom, bang, the thing explodes. She stands there cloaked in a soft, downy fluff of Westchester debris, sooty but for the whites of her eyes.

  Frank turns to me and says, ‘Everything?’

  ‘No, no … no, God, no … the kids are fine. They were in their car seats. Wanna beer?’

  ‘Definitely,’ he says.

  ‘Okay, I’ll just go down to the little store. I’ll be right back.’

  I have nothing in the apartment to feed anyone, busy as I was destroying it all. Hey, there’s a special promotion on eggs. Buy ten, get two free. I think, ‘Well, that’d make a dozen, so, yeah, okay, thanks, but isn’t that rather like “Buy the shirt and we’ll throw in the buttons”?’ Marketing genius, huh?

  Back at home I
hand Frank his VBs and step out onto the balcony. I don’t want Frank asking me to explain again how I can be so stupid. I don’t want to watch Frank pass through the stages of his grief. With the first beer, there will be a stoic acceptance but it will be understood that I am not to leave the room because I must bear witness to the strength he musters. With the second beer, he’ll tour around the apartment silently, bereaving all that is lost, running a finger over this or that. With the third, he’ll come back to me as if I’ve had enough time to accurately answer the question: How can you be so stupid? If there are more beers, he’ll just hold on to the kids for dear life and shudder at the thought of what could’ve happened in this house of horrors.

  When I go back in, Frank’s placing a sheet over his big old Klipsch speakers. I put on my Sauconys. I’m going for my first run in Singapore. Pearl’s all right and is cleaning again; the kids are fine. I’m pretty much no good to anyone; it’s best I leave. ‘Bye, everyone.’

  The elevator ride is too short. I’m outside. I’m not going to do this; it’s crazy. Even though it’s after five in the evening and the wind is picking up and the sun is covered by cloud, it’s so hot. I’ll keel over. I don’t deserve to die. I should stay home, enjoy the food and have boozy playdates for the next three years. It’ll be the age of my complacency, my sleazy new lifestyle. An older woman approaches the lift, smiles and says, ‘Oh, you so fit. Running, is it?’ I nod.

  ‘Good! Good!’ she barks.

  How could I disappoint this little old auntie?