Freeloading Roommates and Dumpster Pizza--Just Another Bachelor Story

I basically lived with every character of Portlandia at one time.  One
guy, Jimmie, found some really neat items while dumpster diving.  

I'm tired, and overworked, and I'm sorry there hasn't been a real post on here in a over a week. This is an excerpt late in my novel. It is fiction, but it is based on real events. In my late teens and early twenties I lived with a constantly rotating stream of Christian roommates that numbered about 7. All of them were insane in some capacity. This is about a guy Dave who never officially lived with us, but made himself at home anyway.  (I'm not going to introduce all the other characters because...I'm tired).

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Multiply this times 4, and you have our old garage. 

I saw the beat up truck parked on Happy Lane, but that didn’t mean much in our house.  Increasingly, there was always cars, specifically Asian imported cars, parked around our house, getting operated on in our garage by do-it-yourself surgeons. They wandered from the operating table with black hands holding parts with dangling hoses and wires seeking second opinions of equally uniformed med students. Our second bathroom became their scrubbing in room, leaving smears of grease on the doorknob, sink handle and flusher.  Living in a car wasteland had grown beyond annoying, but I figured, just because I hate cars, and would rather pay to get my oil changed than do it myself, didn’t give me the right to try and stop their hobby.  I call it a hobby, because the Glossnears, John and Greg, had invested all kinds of money into parts and tools, and had already blown up a few engines.  They called it “tuning.”  But when “tuning” a guitar string the idea is to make it vibrate in key, not break, so I suggested they purchase some malpractice insurance.

Push this off the Oregon coast highway and let it sit in
salt water for a year and you have Dave's Dodge.  

So when I parked next to the 1988 Dodge Dakota, my initial thought was, “why would anyone invest any money into this vehicle at all…it looks like it would be better suited for modern art than transportation.” Then the smell hit me.  Something was dead in this vehicle and it needed more than cosmetic surgery, it needed a mortician. 

As I walked in the front door, I saw Jimmie playing with a pit bull with a spiked collar.  “Please tell me you didn’t pull that dog out of the Scamp’s pet store dumpster.”

“No, this is Helmet, it’s Dave’s dog, isn’t he cute?” Jimmie said giggling like a kid on Christmas day as the dog happily licked his face.  

“Helmet?  Like Hell-Mutt?  Or after the horrible metal band that druggies wore T-shirts of in my high school?” I asked, not really wanting an answer other than why there was a dangerous dog in my house.

“His name is Helmet, because it looks like he’s wearing a helmet…see how his fur is black around his chin, like a facemask,”  said the guy sitting on the couch that we never sat on. 

“I take it you are Dave?  Is that your truck out there, it doesn’t smell so good?”  I replied to the potential Dave.

“Yeah, I just lost the tranny out in front of your house.  Actually I lost reverse somewhere around Montana, and 4^th gear hasn’t worked right for a couple of days, but it just grinded to a halt right out here, and Jimmie helped me push it to your curb.”

“So were you like, trying to make it home and hoping the truck would hold out or something?”  I asked logically.

“Oh, no.  I was just driving around.  I’m from Ohio, and I wanted to drive across the nation with my dog.”

"Oh, of course," I said sarcastically, "Well, you have money, right?  You can fix it and get on your way?”

“Nope.  Left home with $35.00 and spent that on gas the first day.  Been bumming food and stuff from people all the way here.  Worked a couple of odd jobs, raked some leaves, helped a guy clean his gutters, just enough for gas. Figured I’d get a job here in Ugene, {he meant Eugene, but everybody from out of the area always over-pronounces the ‘U’} Jimmie said I could stay here until I could get it fixed.”

“Wait, what?” I shifted my head in obvious annoyance towards Jimmie  “Jimmie, we already have seven guys living here, in a four-bedroom house…we don’t need another roommate, especially one who doesn’t have a job, and we can’t have a dog in the house, it specifically says so in the lease?” my irritation at the idea of ANOTHER roommate was clearly implied.   

7 roomates, innumeral guests at odd hours,
why not add a dog with a propensity to bite?

“Well, technically, I’m not on the lease, neither is Danny or Hank.  And it isn’t a question of “need,” we have everything we need, but Dave needs a place to stay temporarily until he can get on his way again.  Isn’t this what Jesus said we should do, help those in need?” Jimmie asked very innocently.

“Don’t go quoting Jesus in this.  Jesus didn’t have a parable of the guy who ran away from Ohio, stole  the family pit-bull, and tried to make it cross-country in a truck that shouldn't have made it to Illinois…at least the Prodigal Son had his entire inheritance to waste before he returned home…I’m sorry, Dave, but we know nothing about you…you seem alright, even if you are sitting on the couch that nobody sits on, but we don’t have room for you right now,”  I thought I was speaking for the other four absent roommates in this rant. 

“That’s cool, man, I was just going to take the canopy off my truck, set it in the grass and sleep under it for a while--with Helmet, of course.” Dave answered matter-of-factly. 

I had noticed that the truck payload was full of junk, so sleeping in the back wasn’t possible…but who lets a vagabond sleep under a canopy in their front yard?  “I don’t know…we’re going to have to have a house meeting about it.  If the landlords ever came by they would kick us to the curb.”  I wanted to wash my hands of it.  I was hoping Greg would come home and exude some over 40-year-old adult rationale on the situation, but he wasn’t coming home for at least a week or so.  Instead, angrily,  I went to my room and read most of a novel for class and typed a paper on the old computer now in my room.  It was the first homework I had done in weeks, I really was stretched in too many directions.

About three hours later, bedtime to most human beings, I was interrupted by a knock on my door, and an almost immediate opening of my door.  It was Dave. “Hey man, house meeting. We’re having a house meeting. Everyone’s here.”

I really wanted to say to him that this wasn’t his house and he can’t call a house meeting in a house that isn’t his. Logistics and legalities seemed lost on the Lost. 

I walked into the living room and everyone was eating Little Caesar’s pizza, someone had saved me a piece of cheese and a pepperoni, and lots of crusts.  My stereo was playing some God-forsaken music praising God through grunts, primal screams and what sounded like instruments, but more closely resembled the muffled cries of the condemned in hell.

“Can we turn that off? 

It was turned down low. Ben, Danny, Jimmie, John and Dave were all crowded onto the two major couches. Someone had even started a fire in the fireplace, which I didn’t even know worked. It was the most we had looked like a family in the entire six months we had been there. The only seat left over was on the couch nobody sat on, instead I pulled a dining room table chair into the room and grabbed a slice of pizza. 

“So we’re gathered here to vote on the issue of letting me stay in the front lawn until I can fix my truck, are we ready to have a vote?” 

“We can’t have a vote without my Dad or Hank. Plus if this is all formal and stuff, shouldn’t we hear some testimony or evidence or something,” John said almost laughing at the absurdity of it all. He was after all, a junior in high school, even if we treated him like a college kid like we all were. 

It might look diseased, but only your colon can tell
you if, in fact, it is diseased.  

“Well, okay:  I’m Dave, you’re eating my pizza, and I started the fire. I cleaned the engine grease out of the small bathroom today, and I want to stay here for a couple of weeks. Are we ready to vote?  I vote in favor.” 

“You can’t vote Dave, this vote is all about whether you get in the house or not.  And we’re not ready to vote. Plus, how’d you pay for this pizza, I thought you said you were broke?” I implored.

“The President gets to vote for himself, I think I should be able to vote in this scenario. And I didn’t pay for those pizzas, they were given to me cause they couldn't sell them at the end of the day...they're old.” 

I dropped the piece that was in my hand, and felt suddenly sick at the idea of dumpster pizza.  “Dave, you’re clearly not the President, so you don't get a vote..."  

Dave failed the vote, but he still stayed in the front lawn for three weeks until we mustered the courage to really kick him out. He called about 40 house meetings, ate everything in my freezer, and basically lived in our living room for all the daylight hours. Jesus should've had a parable about Dave, the Freeloader.

And there should be a Child Protective Services for dogs that have to live with humans like Dave.  

A Schizophrenic Plea: Stop the Insanity!

Part V: The Road to Wellness 

Dale eventually boarded up his partial house demolition.  He never rebuilt the carport or garage, and only because of his brothers (who lived nearby) did his home ever look functional again (albeit scarred).  Dale obviously didn’t care about physical appearances and beauty.  If something didn’t seem logical to Dale, he rearranged it, or modified it to fit his specific, selfish needs: he was a little like an imbalanced ancient god, one who carried his sledgehammer like Mjolnir, ready to dole out justice on any and all inanimate objects. 

Sorry William Carlos Williams, I've never liked your
poem, but Dale understood it so well.    

Dale’s home was elevated about three feet higher than where his driveway met the road.    The slow decline grade was what allowed his truck to roll down his driveway and into the house we were renting across the street three years earlier. The slope always bothered Dale.

Unlike other people on the street, including us, who built retaining walls to maximize the useable aspects of our yards, Dale thought outside the box.  He decided to lower his entire yard to be perfectly level with the street.  This would obviously be a difficult task even if he owned a heavy equipment business, but Dale wanted to do the job with only his trusty shovel and loyal wheelbarrow. 

The Pharaohs would've only needed like three Dales
to get all their pyramids and statues built.   

This would require the removal of how many square feet? On the small scale it was maybe 1000cf, but probably closer to 1500cf.  A wheelbarrow can hold about five cubic feet of material.  The task was monumental. 

This slave labor, that Dale so eagerly volunteered for, took him half a year.  The soil that was removed was thrown into his backyard and spread evenly for his next great project (making a corn field in his ¼ acre backyard). The work occupied Dale’s mind and body.  The swearing and flipping off were minimalized.  He had a task, and he would accomplish it. 

Pretty much a metaphor
for everything Dale
 tried to do.  

Logistically, the project was doomed.  As Dale got closer to his house, the question became, how to make this look natural?  But natural wasn’t in Dale’s game-plan.  He carved the dirt straight down from his cinder block foundation-exposing the basement wall below.  His home looked like it was built on the side of a cliff.  He even tunneled under his front porch cement stairs, leaving them hanging like a diving platform over the three-foot abyss below.  The strain on that cement and rebar must’ve been astronomical.  But it held the entire time we lived there.  The three-foot gap from earth to porch was too much for Dale to climb each day, so he brought out a small stepladder to reach his staircase.  Again, a logical (yet head-scratching) use of the materials he had handy. 

It was around this time that my family decided to put our house up for sale.  We had finished the long arduous remodeling project, which is a story in itself, and Mom and Dad decided to move south, back to Oregon.  We hoped against hope that any prospective homebuyer wouldn’t ask what the heck the neighbor was doing next door.  “Oh, Dale? He’s just experimenting with landscaping techniques.” 

By this point, I was an eighth grader, and Corey was a junior.   Dale continued to awe us, but we had also become used to his outrageous behavior.  His home, however, was still a mystery to us.  We knew Dale outside his home, but somewhere, the investigative journalist, or sociologist in me, wanted to know how a person like Dale lived on the inside.    

Perhaps it’s why, when Dale offered Corey and I a tour of his current interior remodeling job, that we unwaveringly (and almost joyfully) agreed to enter his home.  Looking back, this is probably where many a situation has gone horribly wrong.  I’ve read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series, and I seen enough crime shows to know that you never purposefully enter strange people’s homes, especially their basements.  But Dale, while strange, was no stranger. 

"Hey, who ate my cold
chips!" 

We were explorers, like young Indiana Joneses as soon as we entered his home.  Dale wasn’t used to hosting people in his house, so we just randomly started looking into rooms.  There wasn't much to see: the home must've been looted by treasure-hunters before we got there.  There was nothing in the home.  Literally nothing in his home.  Two bedrooms, his living room and the kitchen had not one piece of furniture or decoration.  But it was immaculately clean.  I opened the fridge and found one orange and a bag of Tostitos chips.  I chuckled to myself as I wondered what cold tortilla chips tasted like.  Corey waved me over to him and we peered into Dale’s room.  A small portable radio/television combo, a sleeping bag on the ground, and a clock.  That was it.  Every material possession (besides the yard tools) Dale owned. 

Dale was excited to have visitors.  He giddily asked us to see the progress he had done on his basement remodel.  What we saw when stepped down the creaky plank stairs were basic exposed studs.  No murdering implements or torture devices, like I think we secretly thought or hoped, just a blank boring room.  There were still a few pieces of oak paneling on one wall, and Dale, without a crowbar, tore at them with his bare hands.  Eventually he ripped the sheet from the wall. 

Note to self:  Creepy basements with creepy people
not a good or entertaining choice.  

“These, these wires are ugly…I’m going to get rid of them, too,” Dale said, as he grabbed the white Romex electrical line snaking through the stud walls and started pulling. 

I guess we assumed Dale had shut off the power, but he did things a little differently.  After he had pulled about ten feet of cable out of the wall, he hit his first junction box, and let out a long vibrated yell.  Corey and I watched dumbfounded as Dale was hit by at least 20 amps of electrical current.  The scream lasted about five seconds.  There’s not a whole lot someone can do while another is getting electrocuted.  I guess we could’ve found the fuse box and shut down the power, but it all happened so fast. 

Dale released his grip and fell to the cemented ground.  His usually chaotic hair was sticking straight out, and his eyes were large.  He looked at us and said, “That F#*@ing hurt!” 

It was too much.  Corey and I ran upstairs, ran outside and lost it.  After we regained our composure from the hysterical laughter, we wondered if we should check on Dale again…but Dale had made it upstairs and was in good spirits.  Some behavioral therapists are again claiming that electro-shock therapy might be beneficial, despite the negative press it received in the late 1960’s.  Dale proved that at least temporarily, a jolt of 110 volts might be good for the soul.  What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, right?  Whatever. 

The final act that ended up saving Dale, was when he shot our house.  Why? I don’t know.  One day, a loud bang pierced our home and after we investigated the source found a hole in the side of our house.  My dad pulled out a .22 slug and found the casing next to Dale’s dirt driveway.  Dale was staring through his side window, smiling. 

How do we let those most in need of help have
access to weapons?  An interesting
psychological analysis of Lee Harvey Oswald.  

It was the closest my Dad had ever come to punching the man. And he came close a few times.  But Dad kept his composure, and through his intensity forced Dale to admit he did the shooting.  (“To get back at the girls from Bob’s Burger and Brew,” his favorite scapegoat excuse was his reasoning).  Dale had borrowed the rifle from his family.  Again, why?  Who knows, they were almost as nutty as he was. 

My Dad made it happen.  He called the police this time.  This time they were more proactive.  We didn’t press charges, so Dale avoided prison time.  But he was required to see a mental health specialist.  And the road to recovery began.  Dale’s parents finally saw the danger.  Dale got treatment and medicine, and he slowly got better. 

His appearance changed.  The beard was trimmed and the crazy look in the eye was gone.  He no longer flipped us off, and he started using the road to get to his parent's house.  He took care of his yard, and by the time our home sold, we didn’t even have to give excuses for his latest project. 

  

Selfishly, I missed the chaos and entertainment he gave.  But as I grew older and began to empathize with people not as fortunate as myself, I realized my Dad had saved Dale's life.  We’ve driven past his home a number of times over the years and it’s still the same.  He fixed his yard somewhat—it’s no longer a cliff dwelling.  He still lives there, now in his twilight years, and maybe he’ll never be “normal,” but he’s no longer “abnormal.” 

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We live in a time when mental health resources are abnormally missing.  Help is basically non-existent to those who can’t afford it.   The clinically insane, as they used to be called, are out on the streets.  They’re usually harmless, but not always.  And we see them and laugh sometimes.  Glad it’s not us.  But mental illness is all around us, in various forms.  Many of these people only needed a hug, a moment of our time in their desperate hour, a sympathetic ear, or unconditional love from family.  Many now need lifelong medication and years of therapy, but nobody is willing to fund that. 

At least in Italy they let their crazy wheelbarrow gangs
have a carnival in their honor.  

A society that ignores, mocks, and scapegoats those with mental disabilities is one destined to have tragedies.  And as we become more and more insular and isolated as a society, we become more and more prone to mental illness and more exposed to the random violence that these illnesses sometimes manifest.  And for God’s sakes, when the warning sings are there, don’t ignore them like Dale’s family did for so many years.  Help is out there in many forms, through churches, volunteer services, hospitals, etc.  We need to help those who can’t help themselves find some level of healing and normalcy once again—for our safety, and theirs.   

I think I'm Schizophrenic--Just like me...

Part IV:  I Can’t Believe I’m Seeing This!

For Sale:  Newish Toyota pickup, a little rough on the outside,
runs like a champ, may need some body and interior work.  

Remember Tom Cruise’s ecstatic couch jumping escapade on Oprah because of his Katie Holmes love?  Watching Dale wail away on his truck was equally as disturbing, a voyeuristic moment of insanity that is forever glued to my internal retina. 

When Dale’s rage was aimed, his mark was true.  He swung that sledgehammer effortlessly, like a ‘roided up baseball player swinging his son’s tee-ball bat in the backyard.   

Shoot, I like what ya done to your truck
Dale. Gives it, style, like I got. 

The still newish truck was no match.  It caved and crunched and cringed with every kidney shot.  As iron sharpens iron, so does iron dull iron, and the Toyota quickly found itself in the quality category of Pixar’s Mater: A beaten-up shell of a truck.   But the paint, even where it crinkled and warped around new dents, still held the clear coat of a vehicle with less than 20 thousand miles.  Dale would correct that. 

Transfixed, Corey and I watched as Dale imploded on his truck.  Just when we thought the carnage and mental breakdown had been extinguished we disbelievingly stared as Dale reemerged from his house with a five gallon bucket of Orange Sunrise house paint. 

“Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Corey, check this out…I’ll show them.  I’m going 

Honey, What do
 you think of this 
color? Will it match
the curtains, exterior,
truck and totem poles?  

to paint my truck red.  Then what’ll they say.”  Dale uttered to us and nobody at the same time. 

We didn’t respond.  We had no idea who “they” or “them” were.  Was Dale so disjointed from reality that he really thought the world was against him?  Can a few dozen sprouting wildflowers really ignite a self-destructive vandalism spree? 

The first strokes of the hand paint brush slid across the top of Dale’s truck.  Even as a preadolescent I knew that house paint and paintbrushes were not intended for a truck.  Dale’s craftsmanship proved it to me beyond a theory.  The paint was applied thick and unevenly.  The paint strokes were obvious and grooved.  And Dale either found a midpoint line, or was in some back pain from his sledging, for the bottom half of the truck was left unmolested and stock grey.  But the thick latex paint collected in certain spots, and gravity forced small dollops to seek the earth, leaving ten, maybe twenty drip marks daintily disrupting the bottom grey quarter panels.  Even the great abstract expressionist painter, Jackson Pollock, would’ve found no artistic merits in Dale’s work.  This was the visualization and creation of synaptic errors.  This was the brain, broken. 

Again, my father pleaded with Dale’s parents, who looked shaken, but not stirred enough to force action. 

Dale normalized for a while after his frustrations found an outlet.  He went back to his routines.  And we would’ve forgotten his latest worst outburst, if his truck art wasn’t a daily reminder. 

Had Ren and Stimpy marketed "It's Log" to Dale,
he would've found a practical use for it.  

But his frustrations became more frequent and his bad days resurfaced with more regularity.  Some days a few dents, a few swear words aimed at everybody and nobody would suffice.  His truck became his punching bag.  He broke out the back window, and claimed it gave him better “vision” of the road.  He tore out the bucket seat, discharging it in his back yard tree root fence-line.  He drilled a five-gallon bucket upside down as the driver seat instead.  Who hasn’t used a bucket as a temporary seat at one point in life?  Dale, using this practical knowledge, had reengineered his truck to fit his needs.  Comfort and safety= not necessary.  A hard plastic seat that can be easily removed and used as a handy storage device? Yes. 

Kelley Blue Book would have to make a new Used Value category for the level of destruction Dale’s modifications impacted that truck’s resale value. 

Dale’s pleas for help escalated later that year as he finally turned on the innards of his truck.  Until now, he had merely been a cutter, slashing away at the exterior beauty of the truck, but on this day, he left the truck running with the hood raised.  He held an axe and swung into the engine bay at no particular target. 

The engine coughed and wheezed and corrected its timing against each unbelieving blow.  Mom, watching from our bay window, had had enough.  She called the police.  Corey and I had already made it out to the back yard; keeping our distance, but wanting to get closer so as not to miss a single detail to tell our classmates. 

Some days, when I'm eating like Slimmer, I also wish
I could slime people who question my "food choices."

The engine had survived four or five of these chaotic axe blows, but before the cops could arrive to stop the assault, Dale's final blow severed an artery.  I think it was anti-freeze; as it was green and watery, but it could’ve been anything.  The blow was met instantaneously with a grunt and spewing of liquids directly at the attacker.  It must have been hot, because Dale’s scream was like a Nazgul from LOTR.  He was covered in a thin layer of green material, like Slimmer had just ectoplasmed him.  The truck, like a beaten slave, had finally got its revenge, and sputtered, stalled, and died. 

Dale’s pain was temporal.  But it got him out of his insanity.  He found his bearings, saw us, and said, “Did you see that?” 

Yes Dale.  Your insanity is worn on your shirtsleeve.  We’ve seen it all, and we’ve had enough.  It’s no longer funny.  You need help. 

The sympathetic and tired cops who showed up agreed.  Dale was surprisingly cooperative even still covered in his victims green blood.  I think he wanted incarceration or medication or help.  But there were was nothing the law could do.  No laws had been broken.  If somebody wants to destroy their own property, bearing arson, insurance fraud, or endangering other people, it was their God given American right. 

The officers talked at length with my parents.  My dad implored them to get a social worker, a psychologist, anybody with medical expertise out to have Dale looked at.  The officers agreed it was necessary, then talked about being handcuffed by bureaucracy and formalities, and how the process usually takes months before anything actually happens.  They recognized the threat that Dale represented to our neighborhood and himself, but until he actually threatens somebody or harms himself, there is no statute to force help upon him.  He needs to seek it himself. 

Dale, though, rather than knowing how to ask for help, showed he needed help by his childlike actions.  Weeks later, maybe in retaliation for the visit by Johnny law, or maybe just another fissure in his psyche, borrowed a long industrial chain from his parents and attached it to his carport and then to his truck. 

I heard the scene before I witnessed it.  It sounded like a demolition derby.  Dale’s truck, miraculously running despite its maltreatment, was revving close to redline RPMs.  The back tires spun on the loose soil that once was cemented driveway, fishtailing a little to the right and left.   Pulled taught was the industrial farming chain, hooked around the main support beam of Dale’s carport.  The building desperately held its place against the horsepower of the truck.  It shook and shivered and creaked like an old staircase.  The integrity of the beam and supporting structure was violated at key load bearing points and small fragmented splinters shot off at awkward angles.  At last the whole structure met its breaking point and the truck lurched forward, expelling the beam from the side of the house, and pulling 60% of the carport behind it. 

Nothing cuts through seasonal depression like a little natural sunlight. 

Dale’s reverse bulldozing ripped at his home like shrapnel.  It tore part of his back bedroom exterior wall off, broke his side entrance door, and shattered a window.  An elephant could’ve waltzed into his home if it could find a safe way to avoid the nails and splinters and viciously angled broken 2x4s and debris. 

A tornado had just touched down on the corner of Dale’s home, but instead of being a victim, Dale exited his truck, and whopped and hollered like a Cowboy watching an 8 second bull ride. 

 I wasn’t sure if that made us or him the Rodeo Clown.  

        *(Next installment, Part V, is that last...I swear this time).  

Mess with the bull,  you'll get the horns.