My Dad's First and Last Apartment

MY DAD'S FIRST AND LAST APARTMENT

I remember when my dad split with my mom

for the final time.

He got an apartment in Bartonville

in an old run-down Victorian house.

He was on the second floor and had great big

vertical windows

and a view of a couple of different streets.

I was 12 and I went to visit him

in his new apartment

and I thought it was the greatest thing.

I was happy for him,

not that I didn't love

my mother,

but he had this great apartment in town

and he seemed "free".

Growing up we had always lived in the boonies

in some trailer or barn or dilapidated house out

in the middle of nowhere.

My dad’s new apartment had hardly any furniture,

no knick knacks,

one piece of soap in the john

and nothing in the refrigerator

but beer and hot dogs.

He also had a shelf full of books.

They were the same books he’d had

all the years before

but for some reason they seemed different

and I began

to read them.

I really thought we were experiencing life.

I felt I was in some Saroyan

or Carver story

and I pictured my dad

sitting by one of those windows

with his old typewriter

(he was a writer before he got married)

writing about his life

with mom and maybe

writing about the time before that

which I knew hardly anything about.

And I was thinking he'd have

a few girlfriends—

the girls at my school always said he was cute—

and write about those too,

and live a loose and

easy life.

I was proud of my dad,

he finally made a change,

he had warded off something.

But 3 months later

he met a woman at the Save-A-Lot

married her

and moved into her double wide trailer

in the desolate river bottoms

over by Kingston Mines.

For years afterwards

I always looked up at his old apartment window

whenever I drove by

until I got my hick ass out

of Illinois

and learned how hard it is to find

a place to simply live

and be happy.

END