Neighbour, we’ll call her Kerry because that’s where she’s
from, gets galvanised too, and announces
she’s been waiting to replace a bed and offers me the old one. This is great
news for both, she doesn’t have to get it taken away; at the very least I was
looking at 400 euro for a basic one with a mattress for the second tenant’s
room, CC#1 having carted the old brass bed up to the attic. I went to have a
look, perfectly nice pine double bed, it just needed, guess, handymen to
dismantle and re-assemble and we both decided it should be painted white for
the Nordic purity vibe I was re-creating, for which read: all white room. The
strange thing about this interchange is that we have both walked only a few
feet, and figured out a great transaction. This neighbourliness might seem
normal to most of you. I have been living here for seventeen years and we
really only got to know each other at Christmas.
Huggy Noddy had told me to call him if I needed any more
help. This time he came with his colleague, who for the sake of consistency we
will call Big Ears, but he definitely doesn’t. By now Noddy and I had struck up a bit of rapport, he also
had two sons, both in university studying incredibly erudite things. He has a
few properties and knew a thing or two about tenants and a breadth of
geopolitical-cultural knowledge. He was an expert on Botswana, due to his
tenant, Miss Botswana. He could ream off the finer nuances of all the Eastern
bloc nationalities, I think he liked the Poles the best. He says he will be at
the auction rooms in Rathmines on Thursday morning and will come by to sort the
bed. By now I am amassing sundry useful items to donate to his own rentals, a
small tv we don’t need, some lamps which are very nice but I’ve no use for.
I escort the two men to my neighbours, where they exchange polite
greetings. As they walk up the stairs, Kerry jabs my ribs with her elbow. She
thinks Big Ears is a fine specimen, her very words, in fact are, ‘he’s a real
man, look at his shoulders, his chest,’ she swoons, ‘and he’s so well spoken,’
eyeing me as if this would be a good match. ‘Kerry!’ I exclaim, not for the
first time my apparent lack of husband material was cause for matchmaking.
This week, neither son was back at college, what a great
time to have DIY going on, though CC#2 had managed to take a break in Paris
with his girlfriend, he didn’t pick that savoir faire off the ground, leaving
#1 resistant to my pleadings. This subtly
changed however with the appearance of my two new great allies with bits of the
bed. #1 helped while they assembled it and I discussed the paint plan. Before I
knew it, Noddy had got a pot of undercoat from his car, I had the box of
brushes and white spirit at the ready and he was showing #1 how to mix. I left
the three men to chat alone while I found a can of white satinwood, a useful hoard;
it was four years old and still effective.
The two men were on their way and #1 was painting away,
alone. I took a peek, he didn’t want to be disturbed, ‘do you want me to bring
a radio?’ ‘No, I’m fine.’ I congratulated Noddy on his success, #1 would never,
ever, ever have done that job for me. It
was the unique way an older man had discussed how to mix the paint, sand the
wood, and could also have bribed him for all I know.
Now all we have to do is find the perfect tenant. It has
become a bit of a co-op board with the boys and we have to take our existing tenant
into consideration, though he’s so considerate I don’t think he minds
who we have. He says I’m too picky. I can see how Madonna had so much trouble
being considered as a suitable neighbour in Manhattan.
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