I have two fans in my room. One is a ceiling fan, the other a window fan.
In June I moved to Long Beach, turned them on, and heard them whirling, whirling, whirling. All day, all night. Always whirling.
By July I didn’t notice the fans any more. I still left them on at all hours of the day. But I, who formerly could not sleep with air blowing across my skin at night, quickly found it comfortable. I would lie in my underwear on top of my sheets and fall asleep.
Until yesterday. October 5th 2009. A laziness dropped out of the air, and everything was cold. So, I turned off the fans.
There was no more whirling. Instead, I could hear a whole new racket. Other sounds rushed in to take the place of pushed air. For example, I could hear my heartbeat, and I could hear my old doubts.
We don’t separate recycling down here. Well, not in this neighborhood at least since there is no recycling service. There’s just one huge dumpster for the entire apartment complex and we put all our trash in it. People that don’t live in the complex regularly dig through the dumpster to pick out the recyclables. Like bums. If you saw many of the people scavenge through the trash that’s what you would say: “Oh, a bum is going through the dumpster.” But families do it too. I’ve seen a family of four dig through our trash under a bright afternoon sun. Two elementary school aged children had small carts that they filled with bottles and cans. I don’t know what you would say about a family digging through the trash. But if you were a compassionate person, I know you would not call them bums.
People come and search through the trash at night too, quite often. I think they are trying to get a jump on those who will arrive the next morning.
I’m unemployed, but I still have clean and dirty. To me, the trash is dirty. I would need to be desperate before I’d dig through the Long Beach trash on Fourth Street. Maybe the people who dig through the trash are in fact, desperate. But they are also something else. They don’t use a flashlight. They grope through darkness with bare hands, straining to hear the clink of glass or bend of aluminum.
Last night I heard someone like that. I was in my third floor apartment, but the sound of rustling garbage traveled up outside wall and through my bedroom window. It was after 1 AM and I had almost fallen asleep. Whoever it was searched for quite a while. Whoever it was either found a lot, or found a little, and that’s why they stayed so long.
At night I had heard people scavenge before, but never so clearly — never without the blanketing hum of my two fans. I covered my head with a pillow to dampen the noise. I was unemployed, but I was still trying to sleep.
But then I took the pillow off of my head. I let the noises in. Someone was telling me something important, and I wanted to hear what they had to say.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Jim // Oct 6, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Nice post. Well written and thought-inducing. How’re you doing in Long Beach?
2 Erica // Oct 7, 2009 at 10:35 pm
This piece might be your best yet. Subtle yet provocative.
3 Bowman // Oct 8, 2009 at 10:31 am
Jim – Glad you liked it, Jim. I’m doing OK here. Still haven’t completely settled in yet, but I’m getting there.
Erica – Cool! Thanks! I thought you would like it.
4 lou // Oct 27, 2009 at 5:29 pm
very poetic. people are so desperate for money these days. a shopping cart of recyclables can feed a family of your for a week! not literally, they have to exchange the goods for cash first.
some do worst for cash.
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