Full Circle

• Up 8 Pounds
  

• I Find Travis A Place
  

One of the challenges of having Travis as a roommate (and, by the way, I would include a photo of him  to go along with any stories about him, but, he is extremely camera shy, doesn't have a Facebook or a Linkedin, has no photos of himself on his phone, and there are none that he knows about [that he hasn't deleted] in existence -he wears shades when he goes out in public, too, by the way) is that he has a habit of thinking out loud; laying out his options for the next day, as if seeking encouragement from me "Yeah, I think you should do that," or, more cynically, trying to enlist my help in managing his life.

Yesterday (Tuesday, the 12th) Travis was up and out of the apartment early in the morning, on his way to the plasma place to donate and get 50 bucks.

This left me to my own devices.

The afternoon before, as I was on my way to get a creatine drink and then walk up to the Uxi Duxi for a shot of kratom and to blog, and then to the pet store to get Harold food, and then back to the apartment, where I would have a half hour to pack up my stuff, making sure I had my tuner, harmonica, guitar pick, new-ish strings, tip bucket, tiposaurus, sharks, sign, extra strings, spotlight, good batteries for the spotlight, and that I was in a positive frame of mind, before getting on the 9:12 PM. trolley to go out and busk for about 2-3 hours, in order to keep things flowing, especially some money; I ran into Travis on the trolley.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey, what's up?"

"Is there a place around here where we can get some water?" he asked.

I take care of my water needs and always have some on my refrigerator, but Travis, as my guest doesn't want to use any of it.
This is fair enough, but it is the "we" part of the equation that is indicative of the major problem with having him as a roommate, whereby it seems that he is looking for a companion as much as a room to stay in.

"There's a Winn Dixie and a Rouses right across the street right up there," I said, pointing to a couple stops ahead.

"A what?," he asked.

I suspected that this was him feigning helplessness. He has lived in New Orleans long enough to have noticed the two major supermarket chains; where does he get his groceries from if not at one of them; does he go to Wal-Mart for everything? Maybe he does.

"Winn Dixie, and Rouses; the two major food stores in the city?"

"Oh," he said, and then suggested that "we" could get off the trolley and then go and get water for "us" and then I could go with him to his next stop, the library, where I could make the copy of my food stamp card that I need to send off for a free smartphone with, something that he has been encouraging me to do, since he loves his.

This might have been his attempt to keep me, and the key to the apartment, in his sight, so that when he was done at the library and ready to go back to the apartment, we could walk back there together. This would give him a chance to talk my ears off about his possible plans (for us) the next day.
I tried to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, as I told him that I was in the middle of taking care of my business, and that I still had a half gallon of water on the fridge and that I didn't deem the situation to be too critical.

He has some grounds for being concerned about my whereabouts because the turmoil that he throws me into by focusing upon himself has had me running around unnecessarily in the past.

Sunday night, I had only noticed that I had forgotten my harmonica because I took my guitar out to play at the trolley stop, because the trolley was nowhere in sight, and would be a while.

I had time, actually, to go back in the apartment and grab it and return in time for the next trolley.
This was because, even though, at about 9 PM, I had told him that I had 12 minutes to catch the next trolley, and had asked him if I could get a hit of weed off his pipe before embarking, he had slowly and casually taken out his pipe, while talking non stop about something, and then had packed the thing and then just held it in front of him with his lighter in the other hand, as if he wanted to finish up whatever he was saying before lighting the thing.

Sure enough, by the time we had smoked off the pipe, and I was on my way out the door, I had missed the 9:12 PM trolley, and had a whole half hour to kill before the next one.

It was as if my telling him that the trolley came in another 12 minutes presented him with the challenge of trying to make whatever he was talking about more interesting to me than catching the trolley.

Then, when I got out there and realized I had no harmonica, I had to just shake my head.
The whole time I had been packing up, I had been listening to him and interjecting a "yeah," or a "no doubt," or a "I can imagine," or something in between his points, and sure enough I forgot to pack my harmonica.

Wednesday was on myself.

I left for the Uxi Duxi to get a shot of kratom, telling them that I needed to "gulp and run," as I had time to make it to the plasma place, but would have to take an alternate bus and walk an extra mile or so after I got off it. I had checked the map and knew that I had plenty of time if I walked at least 3 miles per hour, to get there.

This, I did.

I had a bus pass that expired at 8:45 PM.

Along the way, I spent the last of my cash on a pack of American Spirits, knowing that I would be at the plasma place and would leave there with 25 dollars in less than an hour.

I left the plasma place at about 7:45 and walked to the Wal-Mart.

Travis was texting me often. He was leaving the library at 8 PM, and would be waiting for me to return and let him in the apartment. His donation had gone well and he had gotten 50 bucks.

I got to the Wal-Mart and checked the balance on my plasma card, before going in to spend money off of it. The balance was $14.08.

They had given me 15 dollars, instead of the 25 that I'd been expecting. Then, had charged me a dollar for the "balance inquiry," that gave me the bad news.

The sand was sifting through the hourglass of my all day bus pass.

By the time I had called and found out that I had only gotten paid 15 dollars, due to the technicality that I hadn't donated twice within seven days (or that they had counted the day that I donated last week as the first day) it was already 8:10 PM.

It took me longer to shop in Wal-Mart than I had planned, of course, so many flavors of Fancy Feast; so little time.

I wasn't worried though, because I would just get another all day bus pass for 3 bucks- the later the better, so I could use it to go out busking the next night; except...

After I took $2.87 off of the plasma card, reducing the balance to $11.21, I learned that Wal-Mart only gives cash back in the amount of 20 dollars or higher. There was no button to hit to get 10 dollars back. This meant that I had to go out to the bus stop and hope the thing came within the next 12 minutes. It didn't.

Family Dollar, the only other nearby hope of getting cash back, closed in another 15 minutes. By the time I walked there, I would arrive less than 10 minutes before their scheduled closing, and I could already hear the lazy employees telling me that they had already shut down the register or see them closing 10 minutes early, like the one on Broad Avenue is infamous for doing.

And, I could imagine the bus going by as I stood there, still without cash.

It was hard not to get angry at Travis, who was incessantly texting me "Let me know when you're on the bus...let me know when you're on the trolley..." etc.

It was the confusion of having him at my place, talking non-stop that factored in to my having not read the fine print on the Octaplasma agreement and having waited one day too many to get the 25 dollars. It would almost serve him right if I wound up stranded in Gretna and had to walk to Howard's place to get bus fare, leaving him stranded outdoors, I thought.

But, I ultimately took responsibility for my plight. I hadn't read the fine print, and I had spent just about my last dime on a pack of cigarettes, and I could have hurried enough to have caught the 8:20 PM bus back to the Quarter, had I wanted to be on "the safe side." It was on me.

The #114 bus arrived at about 8:55 PM.

It was being driven by the same driver who had taken off on me a couple weeks prior. He had let two black people board, who had been waiting there with me, but then slammed the door in my face and drove off after I showed up, maybe 5 seconds later. Read The Bus Driver Story Here
I had thought about raising hell, e-mailing the RTA people, writing a letter to the editor of the local paper, giving it the racial slant that would surely get it printed here in NOLA (perhaps on the front page; nothing is a hotter issue here than racism). I had even thought of concocting some story about my "8 year old daughter" having gotten home from her after-school activities and waited for me to arrive on the bus to let her into the house, and her having been abducted after night had fallen and she was still sitting there on the front steps...crying...

But, even though I had told some of the other drivers the whole story and had even been encouraged by some of them to pursue the matter "You're not the first one he's done that to, he's gotten a lot of complaints," I just let it go.

He let me on with a 10 minutes expired pass; coming around full circle from his previous slight of me.

Travis could breath easier. He was waiting outside Sacred Heart Apartments.

All I had to do was get off on Canal Street and then get 10 dollars cash at CVS off the plasma card, while buying something inexpensive, and then I could get a 3 dollar pass and be back at the apartment within a half hour. Easy as pie, right?

With a balance of $11.21 on the thing, I grabbed a newspaper for one dollar. I wanted to read the write-ups about the weekend's football games.

I scanned the paper and slid my card. It spat out the receipt for the paper, but never offered me an option to get cash back.

"It didn't give me a chance to get cash back," I said to one of the cashiers.

"Those two don't do cash back," she said, pointing to those two machine, one of which I had used.

"Well, I was trying to get 10 bucks cash back; that's one of the reasons I'm buying the paper..Can you refund the dollar and let me ring it up again on one of the machines that gives cash back?" I asked.

"We can't refund papers, because they come through a vendor," said the cashier.

I had 10 dollars and 21 cents on the card. The cheapest thing in CVS was a 19 cent postcard.

After having been disappointed at the plasma place and then having been rescued by a bus driver who might have felt that he owed me, I was prepared to just walk for a half hour, back to the apartment, while Travis stewed on the stoop in front of the place, warding off skeezers every time he lit a cigarette.

But, since most of the cashiers in CVS have seen me several times before over the past 6 years, and I had never been a problem, they decided to refund the dollar for the newspaper to me in cash. I had told them about the plasma and the Wal-Mart cash back and the bus driver and..."OK, OK, here's your dollar!"

I looked at the postcard that I had chosen, in order to get 10 bucks. It was a picture of the park around Jackson Square, depicting a spot where I had slept at times, when I was homeless a few years ago.
"I used to sleep here sometimes, when I was homeless," I said to the cashier who had been nice enough to refund me the dollar. "I guess I should count my blessings and stop bitching about not getting the whole 25 bucks for my plasma," I added.

"Yup," she said with a smile.

"How soon we forget..."

I arrived at about 10 PM at the apartment. Travis had been waiting a whole 2 hours in front of the building. He was too tired to even talk incessantly, it seemed. He had given 900 milliliters of his blood plasma earlier in the day and felt "drained."

At the back door, I stopped to ring my keys to alert Harold the cat that I was home, and had Fancy Feast fresh from the Gretna Wal-Mart.

"Can you just let me in, and then come back out and get him, I mean, I'm really beat, I'm falling asleep standing here," said Travis, irritably; adding: "I mean, I'm not trying to be a dick," something he usually says when he's being a dick; completing a full circle from his "Dude, if you can help me out, you'll be saving my life...I'll hook you up big time!" of a week earlier.

So, there we were, inside the apartment. I had 10 dollars and a postcard to show for the day. I had used the paper refund money to ride the trolley back. I couldn't make Travis wait yet another half hour, that would be cruel.

I decided to pull myself up by the bootstraps, pack my stuff up and go out and busk; even though it was a Tuesday night, and it was approaching 11 PM.
"Are you going out to play?" Travis asked, seeing me zip up my guitar; as if he had hoped that I might sit there and listen to him talk instead.

"Well...yeah...He who doesn't work doesn't eat..." I said, in my best "I'd love to run totally out of money and then be at your beck and call for even a cigarette tomorrow," tone of voice.

I went out and played well and made 23 dollars in an hour and a quarter.

It was very satisfying. Lynda Depanais and her husband, Brian, stopped by at one point, with Lynda sitting on the stoop to my immediate right and listening for a minute before I looked up and recognized her.

She tipped me 10 bucks and said that she wanted me to play in front of her house. "I'm serious; I would like it if you would play in front of my house," she said.

I didn't know if she meant for me to go over there and do a few songs, or is she wanted me to remove myself from the Lilly Pad and migrate almost directly across the street from it, permanently.

I don't know how Lilly would take that.

While we were there, one of the waitresses from Lafitt's, named Kelly stopped by to talk to Lynda, who is her landlord.

Another waitress, Amy is in the habit of standing next to me when she takes her cigarette break. The first time she ever did that, she had sat on the stoop and listened for a while and then said. "Dude, you just totally relaxed me. I was so stressed out from the bar that I had to get out of there, and now I'm calm and ready to go back to work."

Amy is one of the reasons that I'm pushing myself to learn new material, since she hears me about every night. It's embarrassing to be playing one of the same dozen songs every time she shows up. She'll get sick of them soon if I don't expand my repertoire.

Kelly, I met the night that a couple from British Colombia were hanging out and listening to me for most of a night.

Kelly had invited them, along with me, to join her on her patio, which used to be Barnaby Chancellor's patio, before he moved out, to smoke weed and hang out.
There had been a skeezer there then, who was skeezing, and the couple were so friendly and not skeezer-wary enough that they had responded to his "I guess that means me, too" with "Sure, come along," after Kelly had asked: "Do you guy's want to come back to my patio and party a bit?"
There evolved a situation then, after the skeezer had become annoying, when it was like: "I thought you knew him..."

"No, I thought you knew him..."

"No, we know Daniel, we were listening to him play," to which Amy and Kelly had said, "Yeah, we know Daniel, but we thought he knew him..."
"No, he's the guy that grabbed my guitar and tried to smash it a few weeks ago; and I wound up fighting him. He's just pretending to not remember that," I had said, in disgust.
There was a moment when the guy from British Colombia and I looked at each other, both of us assessing our combined physical strength against that of the overweight, incredibly drunk, barefooted, tie dyed shirt wearing skeezer, were we to ask him to leave and he refuse.
We wound up with a drunken skeezer making comments about dogs farting, in between our discussion about how the molecules in the human body could have originated from stardust.

I had seen Kelly a couple times after that night. She seemed undecided in how to treat me. She had been with people whom she had met at the bar, whom she had decided to hang out with after work, and had always returned my "hey" in a friendly, yet reserved way.

But, when she had walked up last night and was speaking to Lynda in a landlord to tenant kind of way (Lynda dresses in high fashion and looks like a million bucks) Lynda then "introduced me to" Kelly: "This is our good friend, Daniel" to which Kelly gushed: "Oh, I know Daniel, I hang around with him all the time out here!" and shot me a look that said "Please don't deny it."

That was the most satisfying part of the evening. Now Kelly might be a little less reserved in greeting me at the Quartermaster when I run into her and whomever she is with.

It's just a fact of life that, even the skeezers on the block, seeing Lynda with all of her diamonds and pearls, stopping to give me a hug, are going to see me in a new light and respect me. If a skeezer is trying to grab my guitar, they might even come to my defense, thinking that they are helping a rich lady's friend, and that that is going to bode well for them, in general.

Lilly has the same effect on people. I think that these ladies enjoy exercising their power that way.
I played a few songs in front of Lynda and Brian's house, while they stayed over at the Lilly Pad, still talking to Kelly, until they went inside, and I called it a 23 dollar night.

I don't want to become a pawn in a chess match between Lilly and Lynda, and I'm hoping I can tell Lynda that the spot in front of her house just isn't good for me because of the cars that are always there blocking the sight of me from most angles, and that most tourists walk on the other side of the street.

When I got home at 1 AM, Travis was too zonked out on the couch to be stirred by the sounds of me making two humongous pancakes, using rice flour, whole wheat flour, ground flax, eggs, coconut oil and then topping them with real butter and blackberry preserves.

I weighed in at 138 pounds at the plasma place. This is up 8 pounds from 2 weeks prior.

The creatine and the little bit of working out and the pancakes with real butter and preserves seem to be working. If I gain 12 more pounds, I can become a 50 dollar donor, like Travis; but; by then I hope to be doing well enough as a busker to make that a mute point.

A Home For Travis

I thought about the time when I was new in town and had stopped where Tanya and Dorise were playing. It was a Sunday night; the night that they typically had an extra microphone plugged in and allowed people to sing karayoke style along with them.

I had sang a couple songs. They were Mariah Carey songs, of all things. It was then that I learned that Tanya was a huge Mariah Carey fan. Dorise had been very complimentary, saying that she could hear some "Prince" in my voice.

Later that night, I was walking by the casino, looking for a dry piece of cardboard. Howard was reclined on such a piece by the ferry terminal, under a little overhang, as it had begun to rain lightly.

"Daniel!" came the voice of Dorise from behind the wheel of a white SUV.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"I'm looking for a dry piece of cardboard," I said.

"Come on, hop in!" I felt like I was being adopted into the fraternity of New Orleans street musicians at that point, and that she had ridden around looking for me, to see if I needed a place to sleep on that rainy night.

Travis' new landlady (right)

I told her that my friend Howard was kind of expecting me over by the terminal and I didn't want to just disappear on him.

But, I remembered that, and the fact that Dorise is in the real estate business and buys and restores houses and rents them out, giving preferential treatment (i.e. lower rents) to musicians such as I was at the time.

In the following months, I demonstrated myself to be too much of an alcoholic street musician to be considered a reliable tenant and she never repeated any offers, outside of asking me once: "Can you come up with 350 a month?" to which I honestly told her that I couldn't do that reliably.

But, I told Travis about this friend that I had.

"Could you call her?" he asked.

I called Dorise the next day and then gave her number to Travis, who called her and is now set to move in to a place that he described as "really nice," at the end of the month.
"Thank you so much for hooking me up with Dorise," Travis said this afternoon after he had seen the place. Her offer of a place to rent had come full circle, in a sense.