I know, I know, it's cliche. Everyone hates their job some days, right? I'm not sure if "hate" is even the right word here but the stories I'm able to tell among my peers have long since trumped any potential one-upping. "Yeah, your job sucks," they tell me after I finish ranting about cleaning up runny diharrea in the lobby, urine in the stairwell, or about the fifth time someone has called me ugly to my face. And I'm a good looking girl, goddamnit.
Seriously though, it's getting to the point where I can't even take talking about it. But I suppose I have to in order to get some relief. What do they call it? Catharsis? Oh right, blogging.
Anyway, I manage a 100 unit apartment building on the south side of a crumbling metropolitan area in the Midwest. A former all girls' Catholic High School built in the 1920s, the building, from the outside, is beautiful. Its the inside where things get...icky.
I started here a little over a year ago, taking the reins from a woman who had held the position for twelve years. Initially, I was impressed by the fact that she made it that long--property management is no easy gig. There have been hints that she perhaps did not make it out with all her marbles--the largest of which a confession she voiced to me the day before I was supposed to start.
We had lunch the day she gave me the keys, a sort of ceremonial "changing of the guard". Over salads at the local Chili's, she told me this story:
It was a typical Midwestern summer--hot, muggy, miserable. The heat made the hallways of the building unforgivingly still--the air hung stale and stagnant save for the occasional whisper of a breeze from the open windows. For a couple of weeks, she had noticed an odd smell permeating the first floor hallway. At first, it wasn't so bad--just the unsettling sort of causeless odor that can spring up in the hallways of communal living: a mixture of ethnic food, cat litter, cigarette smoke, and the natural body smells that come with living in a building without A/C. It wasn't pleasant, yet she could find no source. Confused yet determined to take action, she purchased a Glade Plug-In from Target. The apple-cinnamon blended well with the mysterious scent and, for a while, things were all right. About a month went by. The smell continued to get worse, so she bought another plug in--which got her through another week. The stench had intensified to the point where a hundred glade plugs in in the hallway would no longer cover it. The tenants were talking. She trolled the hallways, breathing heavily--inhaling the air like a hound, desperate determine the head waters of this pungent river. She followed her nose around the corner from her office to the door of the model apartment. Nearly overcome with nausea, but bravely fighting her desire to flee, she placed her key in the door and opened it. Like a caged animal, the sharp, pungent smell of rotting flesh sprung from the room. Her eyes, watering slightly, quickly took inventory: everything appeared to be in its place...except, the windows were completely dark and it was midday--it looked like someone had placed black paper over the screens. Odd. She covered her mouth and nose with her hand, and forged onward. With each step, the black paper seemed to change... had some holes in it....now was moving...."Oh my god," she thought as she realized that the screen was coated with eager, hungry flies! She fled the room in horror and called the maintenance man to search the apartment.
The culprit, you might ask?
She had been given a frozen turkey from a tenant a while back. Since she didn't have room in her personal freezer, she decided to store it in the model, neglecting to note that THE FRIDGE WAS NOT PLUGGED IN. So the turkey sat, defrosted, and then completely rotted in the model apartment. I can't even begin to tell you what kinds of warning lights went off in my head as she told me this story, from the model showings that weren't happening to the obvious notion that if the freezer isn't cold, it's not fucking working. I mean, that shit's just basic.
This story gives was a jumping point for my first day and the follies that follow. Though it would seem this position is cursed, I am determined to maintain my sanity while I battle the bizzare from the frontlines of the war zone, my desk.
