Open Arms for the Dalai Lama

I want to say this in ringing tones—nay, I want to declare this as fiercely, as ardently, as passionately as did the Christian martyrs, avowing their faith even as the crowd jeered at them, hissed at them, spat upon them, and even as the lions raged towards them, their open mouths lusting for blood!

I stand ready at any time, at any moment, to meet the Dalai Lama!

Nor am I alone in this courageous stance, since I have just gone to check in with Lady, who was taking a moment’s respite from redesigning the storefront’s window, since it’s Christmas time, and the original design nobody liked.

“Hey, would you meet the Dalai Lama?”

“Sure….”

We are, you see, unhampered, unfettered by fear and pusillanimity, undaunted by the economic might of China, even though we stand as the merest motes of dust as compared to that country. And in my case, at least, I’m a considerably diminished mote, since I seem to be battling everything, and guess what? Everything is winning.

I have a crazy Spaniard, for example. The owner of the floor below us, he makes a pretty penny—actually, it should be a luscious penny—renting the space to a shoe store, part of a chain, whose headquarters is in Omaha. So every time there is a problem? Omaha writes to him, and that’s a problem, since his English is rudimentary. So he calls the store, and then he calls Raf, and whom does Raf call?

“You have to go home right away, since the plumber is there, and it’s major, and they think it’s coming from above.”

“Oh, and call García and tell him you’re there.”

García being the Spaniard….

OK—go home, after first telling the manager of the store that I am home, and that the gate to the foyer is open. Oh, and where is the plumber?

“On the way….”

A plumber on the way comes as often as Santa Claus in July, so why is my day being disrupted?

Right—so what should have been a morning spent writing now becomes a day waiting for the plumber, so what to do? I decide to clean the dining room, which means washing an polishing two large buffets, two china cabinets, two small tables, eight chairs, the table itself and what can only be described as The Old Curiosity Shop’s entire inventory of bric-a-brac.

The plumber, a charmer, comes at five PM, which means that I had to cancel my class at the island’s largest bank—a client I would like to keep happy. But he does what he does in fifteen minutes, and tells me that it’s completely dry downstairs—just some old water stains, nothing emergent, now cascading torrents of brownish water—as had been described by the manager via Omaha via García via Mr. Fernández. So I pay 135 bucks and send Juan on his way.

Oh, but there is a problem, since Juan discovered that part of the sink is broken. So water was in fact spewing over our kitchen floor. And does Juan have the part? Of course not, so he will come back “tomorrow afternoon.” Given that today is Friday, that “tomorrow afternoon?” Next Tuesday, at the earliest. Still, I gave the plumber my number, and promised to have my cell phone next to me at all times, residing perpetually in my peripheral vision.

So I was grouchy this morning, since I hate it when a cat is at the vet, partly because Mr. Fernández really hates it, and that makes us both cranky. So I had just told him that I didn’t know if I was going to buy the damn turkey that his mother wants him to cook for Sunday supper, since we are celebrating the arrival of a sister.

“I’m having my coffee in peace and quiet and I’ll let you know about the damn turkey,” I told him. So he goes off to work and then is shouting at me from downstairs. Why? There’s a note from García saying the plumber is on his way!

Yeah? The same plumber who has my number and was gonna come in the afternoon? Then I get it—García wants to put me under house arrest, so that I can open the door to any putative worker who might need to show up.

So I break the world’s record for the highest ratio of swear to non-swear words in my response to Mr. Fernández, and then I go to the café, since that was the deal, and no—I’m not gonna spend another day waiting for the plumber, who makes Godot look like the soul of punctuality itself.

So there I am, and the phone rings and I conscientiously try to answer it, but guess what? I’d forgotten that while I can make calls on my wonderful new phone, I can’t for the life of me receive calls, so that means I have to call back one of Rafael’s sisters. And what happens?

There are people, Gentle Readers, whose voice can induce an insurrection, and is it her fault that she has one? Nor is it her fault that I am engaged in an insane transaction with…well, who? That, at least, is my problem, since I know that I bought an apartment as an investment but also as a place for a caregiver to live. And there’s a wonderful caretaker—the apartment is right next to the parents’ apartment—and everything is fine. Except the electric bill is too high, and maybe we should find a caretaker who would consume less electricity. Whatever happened to the romance of candlelight?

So now that’s a problem, but the other problem is that my brother, a lawyer, pointed out that—however logical this whole deal may seem to minds swept by gentle Caribbean breezes—it’s a little half-cocked. Who, for example, am I renting to, if anyone at all? And if the caretaker gets hit by a falling kitchen cabinet—John had a case just last week of that—well then, do I get sued?

So now I have a day with an impending plumber, a turkey that needs to be bought, an entire house that needs to be cleaned, and a stomach that is raging because I forgot to buy my medicine—as I always do, and then remember when guess what? You got it.

So I completely go off on my sister-in-law, who only wants to know if I have a charger for the MacBook Pro, since hers is broke and it costs about 90 bucks at Best Buy—oh, and it’s not just the charger who is broke.

Well, Robertson Davies once said that the person you have become is just as true as the person you were—all those years ago before you became the reigning diva of the Metropolitan opera, and began speaking of your pied-a-terre in Paris. So what does that mean? It means that a six feet three gringo is screaming, telling sis that this family has got to come up with a plan for their aging parents and I cannot be getting calls from six siblings and two parents all asking, demanding, pleading for things that have to be done right away. Remember that plumber? So of course I behave completely irrationally, and tell her that I AM NOT coming to any family gatherings this year, or until everybody gets their act together. Is this reasonable? No. Did I ever say it was?

No.    

So now it’s time to go talk to Lady, and get her to call me, so I can do Telephony 101—how to receive calls. And Lady, as she always does, has the answer. You don’t press the little green telephone, but instead swipe it, towards the little red telephone. Oh, and if you don’t want to take the call, you swipe the red telephone….

So now I’m totally annoyed with everybody, and what has to happen? I have to worry myself again about the Vatican, since it appears that the pope may not meet the Dalai Lama, for fear of offending China. Here’s The New York Times on the subject:

The action provoked a boycott by other Nobel laureates. Archbishop Desmond M. Tutu, the South African winner of the 1984 prize for his battle against apartheid, responded to Mr. Zuma’s action by saying he was “ashamed to call this lickspittle bunch my government.”

And what had the “lickspittle”—first good thing to happen in my day, thanks!—bunch done? Denied the dear old Dalai a visa to attend the Nobel laureates convention!

Lady drifts by, and I have to make sure.

“You’re not gonna renege on the Dalai Lama, are you?”

Lady is wise beyond her years: she knows when it’s better not to ask.

“Nope,” and goes off to find some Christmas ornaments for the front window.

Oh, and if the Dalai Lama wants to come on Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve?

I’m available!