WWW.PBRIPPEY.COM
Gateway To Valley Village
Ah, Valley Village—ghosts, carwrecks, where the bottoms fall out of baby food jars (another story–but because of the scary baby-almost-eats-glass incident, reported to the guilty manufacturer, with proof, I now have many, many free coupons from the guilty manufacturer–which I use for purchases of the guilty manufacturer’s non-glass items…). Also: Valley Village! Where those in serious need run to for aid. Riverside Avenue, Colfax, Magnolia, Laurel Canyon Boulevard–drive or walk any of these main arteries and one glance down intersecrting Huston or Addison has you looking into a little, so-pretty tendril of Los Angeles, one so invaded by white picket fences, lush lawns overlapping onto swept streets, roses climbing every which way, blooming morning glory and trumpet vines noosed around the trunked and flowering and trellises and such that you go: ahhhhh–I will be safe in there, in that pocket of neighborhood–I will be safe (except for the ghosts, the carwrecks, the faulty baby food jars–perhaps I should have sued…)
A day before the ghost-tinkling-piano-keys incident at the charming Valley Village house I faithfully tended while the owners were far across the pond, Wiltshire-browsing, and the housesitters were up north, Alcatraz-exploring–a day before the haunting and after a refreshing dip with my son in the turtle-pool, I was letting the little guy roam the house’s wooden floors when the doorbell rang. It was a summer’s 6pm-ish, so very light out, plus it was Valley Village, where nothing bad ever happens, or so I thought then, so I picked up my baby, went freely to the front door and opened it with a carefree whisk straight out of the Andy Griffith Show, or Happy Days.
A man was on the porch–but not by the front door, more towards the start of the porch, its pleasant bluey, introductory steps, and he had his hands raised as though to placate me and in one of the hands was a battered book. Before he spoke, my brain assumed he was a God-Guy come to pontificate, but another part of my brain was screeching Hello? He’s too frightened to be a God-Guy and You have a baby in your arms, lady, what are you thinking opening the door like Aunt Bee, or even Aunt Bee would have been more cautious! and also Oh, look, there are two young children at the gate.
I had no idea what was going on. Not even when the frightened man began speaking–a strange, complicated tale involving his children–the two, apparently, at the gate. As he spoke, the little girl, who had been checking out the tapping of her tennis shoes on the lawn, wandered to the frightened man via a couple of loopy C configurations. The boy remained at the gate, shooting me glances, but mostly gazing at the sky with a tiny, tolerant smile on his face, as though he wasn’t experiencing anything out of the ordinary–something that immediately frightened me more than the frightened man babbling on the porch. I took a breath and focused on the frightened man’s story, as best I could.
The frightened man’s story–greatly paraphrased, but definitely the gist of:
…and they said they’d expel my son because they have a dress code and I didn’t know of a dress code and he wore my clothes to school, baggy, baggy and I had to get him because he was suspended and I’m due to start my job and child services was saying they’re going to take my kids away, so we took the paperwork to them, but it’s too late to get the bus back where, so I was like out of here, man, we were gone, gone, you know? But then I said I’ll ask the people for help and we came down here into this neighborhood just to ask the people.
He went on and on and it finally occured to me as the little girl came closer and closer, to interrupt him.
What do you need?
He stared at me for about a second, then said:
Money to get home.
And here, sadly, is where the old, single, on-my-own-in-the-big-city me spoke up before I could muzzle myself. I said:
I’m sorry, I don’t have any money.
I used to base this excuse to the pleading person-in-dire-straights outside the grocery store on my needing every cent in my bank account–which was pretty much true, as back then me and money were huge, rabid, I’ll-kick-you-in-the-head-then-run-away-laughing enemies. But one day I refused a one-legged man’s plea and it was around Christmas time, too. A one-legged man! If a young, healthy looking youth is asking for change outside Rite-Aid, that’s one thing, I guess–but if a one-legged man is asking for change, it’s near Christmas, and you STILL pass him by with a hastily mumbled “Sorry”? To my credit, once I got to my car in the Rite-Aid parking lot I realized my mistake and returned to the one-legged man with a few dollars (he said thanks in a voice so absent of sarcasm I was sure this happened to him all the time). The frightened man and his two children? Oh baby, baby, they were the one-legged man, they were the attack of the 50 foot one-legged man and it wasn’t until I’d closed the front door and walked a few steps and took a few breaths that I got it.
What I got:
The man was frightened. The kids. The kids. The kids. That boy, watching his dad by not watching his dad, that boy with the frightened man as his father, his role model. That little girl and her attempt to come closer. The frightened man so frightened, trying to placate the supposed Valley Village Mama with a beautiful home and lush yard and gurgly baby on her hip. Excuse me, but for f***’s sake!
I dashed out the back porch steps to my purse on the patio table. Inside my wallet were the baby food coupons, a few singles and lo and behold: a twenty dollar bill, a twenty dollar bill I didn’t even think I possessed.
I snatched up the twenty, galloped through the house with T on my hip and out the front door (I wonder if the ghost noticed and that’s what woke it up?).
Rushing through the front gate, I paused and looked up and down the street. Darn picket fences, a plethora of roses, silence but for incessant Valley Village birdsong. The tiny family was gone. Noooo! I galloped around the corner–and there they were, the frightened man just leaving a neighbor’s house–obviously dejected.
The young boy saw me first and I swear his eyes lit up with the kind of light that emanates when you’re receiving a good surprise. The frightened man saw me and froze. The little girl saw me too and never broke her previously meandering stride. She trotted right up to me. I looked down into a sweet face and the most thickly lensed glasses I’ve ever seen in my life. I handed her the twenty.
Thank you, she said.
So–you’re going to get home with that?
Yes, Maam.
She was very direct. I so admired her. I wanted to say something great and comforting. But all I said was:
Okay, then. Bye-bye.
Bye! she said and skipped off to the frightened man, with whom I locked eyes. He nodded at me.
Back at the house, letting T play the haunted piano (this is, of course, before I knew it was haunted or played by the haunted or a creepy vehicle for hauntings), I went over and over and over and over in my head about what I should have told that little girl. My hindsight kicking in obsessively, I saw myself speaking comfortably with the frightened man and shaking his boy’s hand. I saw myself telling the little girl:
You know, it’s going to be all right. It really is. Your dad is trying. It’s going to be all right.
I will always, always wish I had said this. In my defense, I had a baby on my hip–but that, the frightened man understood.
And as for the little girl, I think she knew I needed glasses, knew it so much she was willing to be uber-courteous to me when I returned with the twenty. I think she took pity on me.
Thank you, little girl.
It’s going to be all rightallrightallrightallrightallright.
www.pbrippey.com
