Yesterday I spent the day in isolation, last minute packing, again, less than a year after my last move. I have moved four times in the last five years, three of them married to a man I could not live with due to his chronic “infidelity,” or, sex and porn addiction; always, reduced to role of mistress rather than wife. I spent yesterday emotional, often weeping, saying goodbye to the forest and river and birds and squirrels that surrounded my most recent rental, a house I would have been happy to live in forever, were it not for the neighbor who lived beside me, a sixty plus year old man who lives alone, the benefactor of an inheritance, no car, no friends, no lover, alone walking around this city in high-end hiking gear, screaming at the top of his lungs from his driveway for fifteen minutes, two times a week, “Bitch!” “Whore!” “FUCK YOU!” “I HOPE YOU ALL DIE!” “FUUUUUUCK YOUUUU!” On New Year’s Day I’d had enough. Afraid to walk my dog, afraid to leave the house in the hours he might be outdoors, blowing leaves, shoveling the road. Yesterday, on the eve of this move, I cried throwing away photographs and cards and floral notes left by my ex-husband. I cried because due to both of these angry, rageful men, I had to leave my babies, my possum and deer and wild turkeys, my beautiful nature. I had to leave to protect my safety, and this made me even sadder. The stupidity of the reason. The men’s self-obsession, their greed and childlike centeredness.
Today, four men, three young, Black teenagers, early 20s, and one older, forties, white, redneck, high on opiates or kratom or something, came to move me. The neighbor accosted them in my drive, asked to pay for my move. More than once, he asked the men to ask me if he could pay. I declined each time. At the new house, I stood in the basement, directing the young men on where to place the boxes of books. One of them said he is a writer too. I sat reading a story he was working on on his phone. I gave him Saul Stories, gave him my email address, told him to send me the story, that I would help him with it, that I have a literary journal, that I can help him with his writing. Because of the older redneck dude being high af, the move took 3x longer than it should. We had to go back to the old house. The neighbor again accosted the movers, asked where I was, if he could talk to me, “I just need to talk to Elizabeth five mins,” despite two days ago pretending not to see me on the sidewalk as we passed.
The boys said I was right to move, that he seemed like a Jeffrey Dahmer sort.
The boys were so kind to me, so respectful and sweet, going out of their way to help me with the placement of my furniture. Thanking me for the donuts I ran to get. Thanking me for anything I offered them.
After they left, I drove to Burger King. I was starving and tired and emotional. I was thinking, for some reason, of a time at the end of ’23, my (then) husband came to my house unexpected, I was in my writing clothes: sweats, t shirt. “Are you sick?” he said, walking in cockily, the smell of another woman on him. “You look like shit. You look really bad.” I was thinking how that December he allowed his 9 yr old son to say to me, “I wouldn’t swipe right on her. She looks like a man. She looks like The Rock,” how small that made me feel, how I started to wonder if I was looking more masculine due to aging. I felt so old, so ugly, so unfeminine, so undesirable. This was one of the worst periods of my life.
I was thinking about that time, and also about the squirrels and birds and forest I had to leave due to another man’s inability or unwillingness to control his rage, his pain, his self-loathing, his insecurity. How, instead, he had – like my ex, like my ex’s son as directed by his mother – unleashed it all on me, his vileness, his cruelty. And how he wanted to be the victim. Now he wanted someone to listen to why he felt bad.
I was thinking all this at the Burger King drive thru where a young Black woman of maybe eighteen was working, taking my money, waiting for my Whopper Junior, my fries. I was thinking how I was in dirty snowpants, a wool sweater, my old winter jacket, hair needing washed, my face unattended since six this morning. “Here you go, Ma’am,” the young woman said, handing me my bag. “Also, Ma’am, you look really pretty,” she added.
“Thank you,” I said, taking the bag. I was only three seconds from the drive thru window when the tears started again. I thought: was she an angel? I thought: was this divine intervention? I thought: who says something like that? Something so kind, for no reason, at a Burger King drive thru window in 2026, and also: how did she know? HOW COULD SHE POSSIBLY KNOW? How much her words would affect a desexualized fifty-six year old emotionally vulnerable woman? not for the words themselves, but for her generous spirit, her selflessness and charity. She was so kind. That was what I was thinking as I drove away, sobbing again. How much beauty and beautiful people there are still in this world everyone says is sick and ugly and morally bankrupt. It isn’t true. Don’t let anyone tell you that it is true. There are so many kind people and so much kindness. And I mention the race of the young men and young woman only because of how often race is mentioned in negative contexts lately. Don’t let anyone convince you any of that is true. There is so much kindness in 2026 in the world. I hope the young man sends me his writing. In fact, I know he will.
