The NY Times says Manhattan is home to 850,000 apartment buildings with 8.5 million windows. Me, my mom, and our parrot Frank have three windows, giving us 0.00000035 ownership of all the windows in Manhattan. Harrowing. More windows, more vulnerability. I can’t innocently pick my nose in my own home without thinking there is someone teeheeing over my shoulder. No matter what floor you are on: third, fourth, two-hundred-seventy-second, somebody has an eye on you. Frank is shy and never says anything, but I can always feel him looking at me. I don’t care though, I’ll pick my nose in front of him.
That is what makes the elevator so swank though. No windows. No eyes. Just me, my nose, and some nice elevator music. A Manhattan exclusive getaway.
I hated elevator music. Never really understood why someone would form a band and play something so uninspiring it made you want to sit. But now I can fully comprehend. I have a need for elevator music now. My mom takes great joy in reiterating every little drama and fact on TLC or HGTV like: how Tracy cheated on Dan and why that’s good because she was told by her best friend Monica (who is 43, single, 30% plastic, and still single) that Dan needs to get his “priorities straight”; or how much the Thomas family saved money by not choosing “House A: Beachside Lagoon” over “House B: Gangsters Paradise” because it’s a win-win being closer to Joe’s work and his grandparents’ cemetery. So whenever I think she will spew everything there is to know about shows I don’t want to know anything about, I ask if she needs anything, retreat to the elevator, and sit down criss-cross-apple-sauce.
But now I must brave the firing squad. I already got everything she asked for: a box of red wine and everything bagels. I walk in undetected due to the TV fortunately being too audible. I leave the door ajar for minimal sound. I place the bags on the counter and turn.
“Honey, I need you to clean your room.”
Cuss. She has a hectic and hasty look on her face.
“Why?”
“Beeecause people are coming over? So we have to clean? So you have to help your mother for once?”
“People are not going to be in my room.”
She stares with disgusted gawk.
“... I really do not need to deal with this stress right now. Could you just do what I ask?”
I imply a ‘sure’ by moving. Frank looks into my soul and questions my significance. I open his cage and he hops onto my hand with gusto. We go into my room and I play Mr. Mister’s “Broken Wings”.
“Take these broken wings, and learn to fly again, learn to live so free”
I have two functioning windows. One broken window. On the ground, five stories below the broken window of my room, lies Frank. The champion parrot. My champion parrot. The song was so moving.
“What happened to my window?”
“My hand is bleeding.”
“Where is Frank?”
“He rose to the crescendo.”
