I Love Everybody (and Other Atrocious Lies) Read Online Free PDF Page A

In fact, forty-seven of my fellow men were all living in the same apartment a couple of blocks away before the INS busted up that hoppin’ party several months ago. On certain streets, it means you’re rich if you have a broken, torn couch
and
a recliner on your front porch. By those standards, I suppose I’m the Bill Gates of my ghetto, flaunting my boundless and extreme wealth by pitching a carport in the dirt of my backyard. Shame on us, putting on airs. Filthy, greedy bourgeois!
    How pretentious we were when we decided to remove asbestos and flaking lead paint before we moved into our house! Living like the kings of Fancy Pants Land, we were! That’s right, we’re too
good
for cancer and blood poisoning! But we snobs were sure taught a lesson when we arrived one morning and the house had been completely cleaned out, including the bounty of contaminated drop cloths and the bathroom sink. It was very unsettling to know that someone had been going through our things, and at that time, I wasn’t sure whether it was more unsettling for me to have robbers or the DEA ransack my house (long story), because, in hindsight, I’ve learned that neither one comes back to clean up afterward. After the robbery, we used our air-conditioning savings to install a security system, and slept in pools of our own sweat for the next two summers.
    My husband was admittedly being a show-off when he left a ten-speed with dented rims and two flat tires in our backyard, because someone also felt the need to relieve us of that little pot of gold. That’s when we used our Christmas savings to get bars on the windows, and I was forced to give “Hug Coupons” to my family for holiday gifts.
    Now comes the really sad part of the story. Pity the poor little thief who mistook the disintegrating circa 1985 Pier 1 wicker chair that was missing a seat for the ancient throne of Cleopatra, because despite its four unraveling legs, it had a little outside assistance walking off our porch. That’s when I used the money I was saving for a trip to the gynecologist to get metal security doors and got a handheld mirror instead.
    And, oh, what bravado we, Mr. and Mrs. Livin’ Large, exuded by driving around in a truck with a dented, scratched tailgate, because someone also helped themselves to that morsel from the car part buffet, unhinging it from the bed and simply walking away with it. As a result, we started parking in the backyard, under the shade cabana I bought with my own money, money I had saved and earned from
working.
    That was an American Dream short-lived, wasn’t it?
    I’m not sure what to do now. Skip a mortgage payment and build a fire pit around my house, dig a moat, or smear something gooey and moist on top of the wall? Maybe I should take a tip from my old neighbor Frank, who laced his yard with trip wire that had “enough volts to knock a horse on its ass” after a seven-foot Barney Santa was shanghaied from his yard during Christmas of ’95. Frank would also chop down trees in his front yard after he had fights with his wife, so I’m not too sure how realistic that option truly is.
    An hour ago, though, I took a black Sharpie marker and wrote THIS WAS STOLEN FROM LAURIE NOTARO on everything I thought was worth more than ten dollars, including the replacement bathroom sink and a rug that smells like pee. Not that it would deter the kind of thief that was brazen enough to steal something as big as, say,
a bedroom
from my backyard, but at least I get the last word.
    It’s a disturbingly small reward, especially since someone out there still owes me a Pap smear.

         
    Rolling Down the River

    H ELP ME!” I screamed when I saw anything that looked like a hospital uniform pass me by.
    I was nothing but a fool.
    A big, dumb, yelping fool.
    Had you asked me merely thirty minutes before if I thought I could hold it together if faced with a good deal of physical pain, I would have said, certainly yes.
    Of course I could hold