A Friend in “Need”

The call came at what seemed like a good time. My old friend Skip (not his real name) was in a bind. He was living in North Carolina and he had just lost his job and his rent of $800 was due. He was mad at the landlord and didn’t want to pay it.

“I figure we can help each other out”, he said, “I can give you about $500-600 a month and we’d both be better off”!

The issue for me was giving up my privacy. Skip and I went way back to high school, but we had never lived together. We were and are two very different people; both of us would be struggling for control and I knew that would cause arguments.

“Skip it would have to be 600 a month to make it worth my while, considering the cost of utilities.”

“Oh, OK”, he said, “Well I sure want to get out of here”

“How soon are you taking about moving?” I asked as I looked at the calendar, which read Monday January 12, 2009.

“I would be there Thursday, the 14^th”, he said, “I can drive straight down I-85.”

The suddenness of the move shocked me. I wanted more time to clean up his room area and bathroom. Plus I wanted more time to get used to the idea of not being alone in this house anymore. I was feeling a sense of reluctance coming on. I caulked it up to me just being selfish. Boy I’m going to have to learn how to listen to myself when the alarms go off.

It seemed like he arrived in the blink of an eye and in that instant my quiet existence became a tension filled cohabitation of my home. I showed him his private bedroom and bath area, and let him use part of another vacant bedroom for storage. There was also a bonus room that he could workout and watch TV in. Then I showed him the kitchen, family room and the laundry room with a washer and dryer he could use. There was plenty of space for him to be here and he quickly made himself at home.

Turns out when Skip arrived he had no money, or so he claimed. He was living on food stamps and said he brought a feast with him that we could both share. He had about 20-30 steaks in his cooler, even though he knew that I don’t eat beef or pork anymore. Everytime he went to the store he bought more red meat, even though he was supposed to be buying things we both eat. Meanwhile, I did my regular cooking thing working with chicken, ground turkey and fish, making soups, turkey chili, gumbo, veggie pasta, salads, and so on. He ate everything I cooked and had seconds. In other words, we shared my food but he saw to it that I couldn’t share his.

I also like wine and I would always keep a bottle of Merlot for company. But 6 bottles of wine later, I learned that he believed any open bottle of wine was meant for him. During the Super Bowl, a lady friend of mine and I were sipping the Merlot from wine glasses. When I looked up, Skip came waltzing in the room with a big water glass full of wine, drinking it like grape Kool-aide. He looked over at me and laughed as if to say, “You can’t get me to drink out of that little glass”. That’s when I knew that he thought the whole thing was funny, and right after that I started hiding the wine in my room.

He said had no money, but he always seemed to have enough change to buy gas for his SUV and a 40 ounce can of beer every night. When I emptied the garbage, I heard bottles and cans clinking around in his trash. He sat around all day working out, never looking at the want ads for jobs. If I let him use my laptop, he would surf for news from our hometown, even though he hated the city with a passion.

By March 1^st, , or about 50 days into his “visit”, I told him the rent we discussed was now due. The conversation quickly turned ugly,

“I thought you would understand”, he said, “the job market is tight and I don’t have any money.”

“Well why don’t you call a relative and see if they can help you out, cause we got bills to pay!”

Skip became very angry and said, “I’m not borrowing any money from my family!”

“Oh, but you don’t mind taking money out of my pocket! You didn’t tell me you were coming here penniless; you said you would save money by paying me $600/month.”

“You expect me to pay $600/month to live here?”

“That’s what you said to get in the door” I said, “If you’re gonna stay, it’s time for you to kick in!”

“Well I’ll let you know by Monday”!

I didn’t press it and I let it slide for a couple of weeks. He got a job working at a car repair place, but he didn’t say anything about rent. Finally, I decided to take him to lunch to let him know that he had to leave.

“I’ll give you some money next week,” he said, “That’s when I get my first check.” A week later he gave me $200 dollars from his first check. By now he’d been living here nearly three months and was almost 1800 dollars behind what he promised. As he laid the money down on the counter, this became his mantra.

“That’s the best that I can do”, he said as he walked away. It was like he had worked out a formula in his head and that was what he was going to pay me. Only problem is, he never talked about it with me. Three more paydays came and the money got less and less. $150, $105.00 and $140.00 were the last offerings. He’d just lay the money down and walk away never talking to me about it. I couldn't take it anymore.

“Skip, we need to talk”, I said as I looked upstairs. He came running downstairs like he was ready to fight.

“I see where this is headed”, he said. “You’re trying to say I’ve used more than that in utilities, which is bullshit. I haven’t run up that much of a bill.”

“Dude, why don’t you wait and see what ‘I want to talk about, instead of jumping to conclusions?”

“No, I don’t have to wait. You’re a predictable motherf***er; I can see right thru you!”

This was the problem with Skip. You couldn’t have a rational or calm conversation with him. He was both judgmental and defensive. I guess he figured he could intimidate me by raising his voice. It was then that I realized that I had been avoiding this conversation because I knew the big blow-up was inevitable. I really didn’t want to talk to him about anything; I just wanted him gone.

“Skip, here’s the problem. You’ve worked out some formula in your head for what you think you should pay me. But for some reason you don’t think you have to talk to me about it. You’ve decided what your rent should be without talking to me! All you say is that’s the best that I can do!”

“Well that is the best I can do!”

“Well since you don’t want to talk about it, all I can say is that this ain’t working for me.

“Well I’m outta here,” he said, looking back like he thought I was gonna stop him. But my response stopped him dead in his tracks.

“How soon can you leave?”

“Well, as soon as I can pack”, he said slowly as he tried to size me up to see if I was serious.

“Good! Can can do it today?

"Yeah", he said

"Fine," I said, "then you can keep your $140.00, cause you'll need it"

He was startled into a brief silence as he headed back upstairs. But then he started going on the attack again, by getting personal, calling me being selfish, telling me that all my friends hated me, and that I was jealous of him and his job. He also told me I was a failure and that I was trapped in the past and that no woman would ever want me. That's the short version and I might have missed a few.

“You can call me anything you want Skip, but make it LONG DISTANCE”, I yelled back. “Tell your story walking my brother, and whatever you do, DON’T STOP PACKING!”

Two hours later he was packed up and driving off. He calmed down enough to say thank you and we shook hands and I wished him well. I don’t know where he went, and I really don’t care. He had used up every bit of patience and good will that I had for him. That’s when it became apparent that my best friend really hated me for being who I am. I had opened my doors to someone that had no intention of pitching in and helping me pay the bills. He got there and looked around and decided that I didn’t need any help and he was determined not to provide it. Where did I go wrong?

My friends on Facebook offered a lot of advice, when I asked the question,

“How long would you put up with a deadbeat roommate?”

The answers were humorous and informative. Jennifer said she’d been living with a deadbeat roommate for 8 years; but she was stuck with him because they were married. Others said I should have laid out the rules of the house in writing from the beginning. Another told me that I should have written up a letter of agreement for the rent as it was agreed to and signed, before he moved in. Some told me that they would only let him stay for one month before he had to go, if he didn’t pay rent. But another friend, Adrienne, said she might give a friend up to six months to work things out because in her words, “Friends are the family we choose”!

Adrienne’s words are beautiful and I agreed with her at first. But then I realized that I had been thinking the same way, when I opened my door to Skip. You end up giving friends a break because you love them and trust them, like family. But some of them don’t deserve it and you may not find out until it's too late. The best way to avoid a situation like this is to make it a business transaction from the get go.

1. Agree to a specific rent amount that spells out what they are responsible for
2. Ask for a security deposit, or work it into the rent
3. Spell out in the agreement what the roommates responsibilities are, if they can’t pay the full rent. (i.e. Cutting the grass, vacuuming and cleaning the house, washing the car, doing the laundry.
4. Spell out the rules of the house, like not leaving dirty dishes in the sink, and rinsing your dishes before you put them in the dishwasher; household chores, etc.
5. Also spell out what food staples that you will pool your resources on like dishwashing liquid, laundry detergent, hand soap, paper towels/napkins, butter, ketchup and so on.
   
6. Put everything in writing, stipulating when the rent is due, and get it signed and notarized.

These tips might not cover everything, but it’s a good start. In these tough economic times, more of us are considering opening our doors to roommates to share expenses. Simple rules and steps like these can keep you from going through the 4 month nightmare that I just experienced. But it also might save a friendship, because any true friend in need should have no problem signing a rental agreement. It’s better to make your expectations clear, instead of assuming that you’re on the same page, because people who owe you money often get amnesia about the promises they made.

As for me and Skip, we could be friends again in the future and maybe we could be neighbors. I feel somewhat guilty that we couldn't work things out, but I keep thinking of the saying at the nightclub when it's closing time,

"You ain't gotta go home, but you gotta get the hell outta here!"

Hug Your Mom For Me!

Each year at Mother’s Day, I realize once again that my mother is gone and I don’t think about her enough. Lois Brown Metoyer, a beautiful courageous woman, lost her battle with brain cancer in June of 1972, just as I was finishing my junior year in college. She was 43 years old when she died and I had no idea then how young she was. She’s been gone now for almost 37 years, actually dead much longer then she was alive in my world. It still doesn’t seem possible because she was once so full of life.

I think of how Mom and I had clashed throughout my high school years. My parents had insisted that I go to an all-white, all boys’ school and we had also moved to a white neighborhood. It wasn’t that we sought the company of white folks. It was that my parents fought to integrate areas that had always been segregated and they had the courage to be pioneers. What’s the point of fighting racism if you’re unwilling to meet it face to face? But being a pioneer had its’ issues and for me it was girls; there were none at school or in my neighborhood.

Mom didn’t want me to date until I was a junior in high school and had a fit if she ever caught me talking to girls on the phone. So I would sneak to the phone booth at the mall or to a service station to call the only black girls I knew. There were white girls living in my neighborhood, but my Mom would have murdered me in my sleep if she ever caught me looking at one. She didn’t hate white women; in fact she had many white friends. But she hated the thought of a black man dating anyone outside his race. If she had met Sammy Davis Jr. in 1960, he would have lost his other eye, after he got married to white, Swedish born actress May Britt.

There’s no doubt that Mom wanted the best for me and I knew that. But it was a time when I felt smothered. She had no brothers, so she had no idea how to raise boys. There were four kids in our family and I was the oldest boy. So I guess I was the test case for her and her two younger sisters. One of my last high school memories was about my hair and graduation. She wanted it short and close cropped, while I wanted an Afro.

“I can’t stand that AFRO mess”, she said, “Your hair doesn’t fit under the cap”.

Dad took me to the barber shop that night and supervised the hair cut. He tried to compromise, because he understood how I felt.When I came back home, she still wasn’t happy, but Dad calmed her down. Later he gave me these words of advice,

“Son, no matter what, don’t upset your mother!”

Later that night I walked the stage and got my diploma as my parents looked on. My Dad shook my hand and said congratulations. But all Mom saw was my hair,

“I can’t believe you had that AFRO mess”! So much for the joy of graduation night.

Three months later, I went away to college at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln. Mom and Dad drove me down there and helped me move into the room. They looked at each other and Dad said,

“Well son, we better go so you can get settled in.”

For the first time I could remember, my mom was speechless. She just looked at me from behind her shades and I realize now that she was crying.

“I’ll walk you to the car”, I said, as I suddenly realized I was about to be alone.

“No son, you stay here, we’re ok!”

We said our goodbyes and I watched them walk down that long hallway, with my Dad’s arm around her. I thought she’d be glad to see me go. But it wasn’t until then that I realized that she loved me very much, even though we always seemed at odds.

My college years were a blur spent focusing on my own selfish ideas of what it meant to be grown. I never called home and never came back. I wanted to prove that I could live on my own and support myself. But my world and the world of my family was rocked when we learned that Mom had a brain tumor that required surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. The doctors said they got it all and there was hope.

I came home for the summer and could tell she was suffering. But we found a way to communicate through music. We both loved jazz and rhythm and blues. When I came home from work, I discovered that she was stealing my records and playing them on her stereo.

“How did that get up here?” she would say, “You must have left that on my record player”! We both laughed, knowing that she was the one with sticky fingers.

But a few months later we learned that the cancer was back and that it had spread through her body. There was nothing else the doctors could do. I came back home from school to visit and could see the change in her face and I knew that she was dying. She searched my face when I came in the hospital room and she could read me like a book. Tears started rolling down her eyes as she looked at me, knowing what I was thinking. By now she couldn’t speak because the cancer had taken her motor skills away. So we just looked at each other in a long glance, reading each others thoughts.

A few weeks later, Mom was gone, freed from the suffering of being trapped inside a body that didn’t work anymore. To this day I am filled with regret, that we didn’t have more time to get past those teen age friction years. I wish that I could have shown her that I was going to do something with my life, but we ran out of time. Two years after she died, I was a successful TV anchor in our hometown, but my Mom never got to see it once. Fortunately my Dad was still there, and we became great friends as adults. But you know how it is; we want to make our Moms proud first; that’s why everyone says “Hi Mom” on TV. Of course there’s no telling what she would have said, because I did the news with a BIG AFRO!

So please do me this favor. Hug your Mom for me, and let her know how much you love her.Hug her like you know that she won’t be there one day; celebrate her life, her wisdom, her grace and beauty. Hug her like you don’t ever want to let go, even though one day you’ll have to. Prepare for the day you have to say goodbye, by making sure that you didn’t miss a “reasonable” chance to make her happy. And remember my dad’s advice,

“No matter what, don’t upset your mother!”

Happy Mother’s Day Mom, I love you always!