This morning there are gulls in the neighborhood, loudly screeching, flying low over the garbage bags lined up on the sidewalk, spreading their impressive wings. We are nowhere near the water. I mentioned it to the man at the corner store and he, too, had heard them and remarked on the strangeness of it.

The cat the landlady keeps in the hall scratched at the floor all night and mewed incessantly. The landlady opened the cellar door abruptly before dawn to yell,"WHAAAT?!!" (All three of us knew what, but no one ventured anything.) It gave me an unpleasant start and caused me to picture my father. The cat, who may be a boy or a girl but is currently too small to properly be either, fell silent.

Mr. Stewart who lived across the street, hasn't returned. His laundromat at the corner only opens once or twice a week now, under the auspices of his assistant, a shrunken blue-haired lady with sharp eyes. Mr. Stewart and his adopted grandson Robert had to be removed from their place two months ago because of a carbon monoxide leak from the furnace. We don't know who called the police. The firemen knocked out most of the windows in Mr. Stewart's apartment building, which is how we discovered the reason for his absence. A lone police car stood vigil for the better part of a day. After another couple of days his son came from no-one-knows-where to board up the first floor windows.

The police car gave the landlady cause to spread the rumor that Mr. Stewart had been charged with homicide, even though the neighbors who were waked by the lights and sounds of broken glass on the night in question, spoke to Robert and Mr. Stewart before they were wheeled away. "The cops never stay unless they're investigating a crime. Wouldn't be here unless they'd suspected a murder or someting like that," she repeated with an ominous pleasure. She thinks Mr. Stewart deserved what happened. According to her (and to everyone, really) the place has fairly fallen in on itself since Mr. Stewart's wife died. "They shoulda knock'd a hole in the roof let that gas out; they can do that you know," says the landlady.

Prospective roommates/landlords. Please chose one.
1. Asks about the timing of your meals and preferred cooking method.
2. Requires you to name your prescribed medications.
3. Insists that you join their food co-op. ("It's really not up to me," they say, shrugging their shoulders in a cutesy way. "It's in the bylaws.")*
4. Requests that you self-identify according to Myers-Briggs typology.
5. Asks you to discuss your application with their spouse at an international exchange.


*It actually is in the co-op's legalese (emphasis mine): "People who have the above living arrangements [co-habitation] must always join the Coop as households whether or not they intend to share Coop products." Children are exempt.