soup

BFMV
FUN FACT: last night, some assholes broke into my car,
and seven others,
in the relatively secure (i would’ve thought)
parking garage below my building.
with all eight BFMV cases [police talk],
a back window had been smashed in.
it’s the second such instance in less than a month.
i put the time the crime was committed
between 12:30 am and 10:00 am, saturday, july the 13th.
nothing from my car was stolen
because, honestly, there was nothing in there worth stealing.

here’s a quick inventory of what wasn’t stolen:
- 3 binders of old burned CDs (estimated value: $0.00)
- 2 deflated l.a. clippers… thundersticks? (estimated value: $0.05)
- 1 used book (estimated value: < $1.00, or priceless)
- 1 already endorsed paycheck (estimated value:

the silver lining, i guess,
is that it seems like the only time
i realize that we even have neighbors
is when someone’s car gets broken into.
if there’s a silver lining, it’s that,
and also that i finally got to meet
the guy who owns
the incredibly dusty lexus
with the backseat full of clothes
that hasn’t moved since we’ve been living here.

after cornering me in the garage,
he told me that, in a case unrelated to this one,
his sister had stolen the engine
right out of it.
other points of interest:
he believes that casino owners in china
are rigging the nba finals,
that eating fennel seed will cure whatever
he saw wrong in my eyes,
and that miss india is the most beautiful woman
in the entire world.

i’m waiting silently, awkwardly, on the sidewalk outside,
having ended the conversation with the lexus owner
with a cordial handshake,
for the glass repair man,
who’s clearly overcharging me, probably double, to finish.
he’s reassembling the door now
and will after that, hopefully, vacuum the glass off the seats.
cars pass by, their drivers see the broken glass,
the window repair truck,
and i can see it in their faces
that they’re questioning their own safety,
the neighborhood they’ve chosen.

behind us, the little turkish girl who lives on the second floor
comes out onto her patio
and sits down at her chalkboard
to finish working on a drawing.
“this is my best work yet!” she cheers,
turning around to make sure we can hear her.
i’m searching for the right compliment,
staring off at my reflection coming to be
as the repair man rolls up the new window
for the first time, without a hitch,
and i look ridiculous.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 13th, 2009 at 3:29 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.