Our three prior moves had gone so well. All were done by Murray Moving and Storage in Pawtucket, and all were fully paid for by the Navy and by the Providence Mental Health Center. They were the kind of moves where they pack everything, even the ashes in your ashtrays, and unpack everything when they arrive. The foreman on all three jobs was John, a small, thin black man whom I insisted upon after the first move. He was quiet, efficient, careful, and strong. Three big burly Irish guys could not get the grand piano up the front stairs of our home on Upton Avenue. "Fuck it," said John, strap the thing on my back." They strapped the body of the piano, without the legs, onto his back with thick woven straps, and he walked up the stairs himself into the house. It was a feat worthy of a Bulgarian bulvan.
There were two phases to this move. First, I needed to send the Steinway baby grand piano, the very one my mother and father bought for me brand new when I was 6, to New York for Josie, along with our gorgeous but huge burled ash dining room table that Aunt Lyn helped us to select, and the two oak dressers that belonged to Gilda and me as children. Hers had a decal of a cute cocker spaniel on it, while mine had one of Jack Jump Over the Candlestick. What a dumb decal I had! I wanted her cocker spaniel so bad, but despite countless noogies and drools, she wouldn't give it up. The movers would bring this stuff to New York, and bring back to our apartment Marjorie and Jonathan's smaller dining room table that would fit nicely in our apartment.
I was conned. It was my own fault. I'm the contrarian. I know better than anyone else. If everyone else says, "Use Paul Arpin, he's reliable and honest," then he's the last one I'll use. I'll find someone better. I used the tried and true Farklempt method. I opened the phone book and scanned the ads. I did call Paul Arpin, along with Viti brothers, which had absorbed Murray Moving. John was no longer with them. They both wanted $3,000 just for the New York part of the move. And then I saw it. A tiny ad amongst the giants, "Taylor & Sons," a local company. I called them up, and Al Taylor answered. Turns out it was like "Sanford & Sons." Al Taylor came by. He looked like he had stepped off the box of Uncle Ben's Rice, a black man with curly white hair.
He was wonderful, charming me with his homespun essential goodness, "Oh my, Doctor, your wife goin' to Israel? I'm goin' to pray for her in chuch every Sunday." Al quoted me $1100 for the move to New York, and that's what he charged me. Sure, his three men combined had the IQ of Britney Spears; sure, I had to help them lift and carry the piano; sure, they were an hour late in coming, and took all day to get to New York, so that they were finished at 4:30 PM in New York; sure, Jonathan had to help them with the lifting; but the price was right. Sure, they gouged out long railroad tracks on my floor with the piano dolly, but Al made good on it by bringing a rug to New York and bringing back a very heavy computer hutch to the apartment for nothing.
But the move from our house to downtown was the move from hell. It took 3 full days to move into a small two-bedroom apartment. Carol had gone to Israel, so I was lonely, anxious, and irritable to begin with. The movers, as usual, showed up late. They began to pack. To be fair, we had told Al that we wanted him to pack only the kitchen, and we left the closets full. But how long does it take to pack four clothes closets? By the end of the day, they were half-packed. They did, however, manage to get my bed on the truck. In all the moving guides, they tell you to pack a suitcase with your immediate clothing and toiletry needs. But all our previous moves--from Roslindale to Quonset, from East Greenwich to Newton, from Newton to Providence--had taken one day, with all the packing. Who needed to pack a suitcase. So, for three days, I wore and slept in the same clothes, lying on the sofa in the apartment, with no toothbrush, no shampoo, no soap.
Alex Shuhgalter, our Russian emigré cousin from Los Angeles, stopped over. He was staying at the Biltmore, receiving an orientation for his forthcoming European tour as a Fulbright Teaching Scholar. He asked me, "Michael, who is this Buddy Cianci? Is he real, or is he a creation of Stephen Spielberg? We were addressed by the Assistant Secretary of State, by the Assistant Secretary of Defense, by the ambassadors of all the countries, by senators...and no one could hold a candle to this man. He was the most charismatic speaker I've ever heard, and without notes!" We had a lovely dinner together at Gracie's, and Alex offered some decorating tips for our apartment.
The second day, they finished loading the truck and drove to Center Place, but they did not finish unloading until after 5:00 PM, and the management made them leave. Guess what was still on the truck? Right, my clothes and bed. Another night on the couch in the same clothes. But I ate in style. Alex and I met again for dinner with my mother at Café Nuovo.
At the end of the third day, they were all unpacked. Al Taylor appeared with a bill for $2,000. I noticed that someone in his crew had stolen one of my new cell phones. The apartment was a hekdesh, a hurban. I didn't know where to start. Carol was coming home Monday evening, and I didn't want her to enter the front door, take one look, and, as they say in Providence, go to Butler's. At least the phone company and the cable company came as promised and installed the TV cable, the high-speed internet, and two phone lines.
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It was Saturday. The sun was going down. I tore off my dirty clothes and took a 45-minute shower, shampooing twice. I brushed my teeth for twenty minutes. I put on my best outfit, the one I wore for Andy and Neal's Brit Ahava, and walked through downtown to a pharmaceutical dinner at the Pot au Feu. I sat with good friends from the good days at the Providence Mental Health Center and RIGHA, Brian Hickey and his wife Michelle, and had much too much to drink. We just laughed through the presentation, enjoyed our food, and walked around downtown. Waterfire was burning, and the crowd was delightful. The walkways along the river were filled with tens of thousands of people. In Providence, you're bound to know every tenth person, but at Waterfire, you greet in friendly fashion even those you don't know. There's something about the bonfires, the New Age music, the water, the beauty of downtown that brings people of all classes, races, backgrounds together as human beings. We ran into Barnaby Evans, the creator of Waterfire, who was orchestrating the sound, and chatted about the meaning and wonder of it all.
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I wandered back toward our new building, crossing through the terrace at Café Nuovo, our favorite restaurant, which is right next door on the river. There, at a waterside table, holding forth, was Mayor Buddy Cianci, just days away from a RICO conviction and probable jail sentence. As always, he was alone. He has no close friends, it seems. He is married to the city and the people. Passers-by stopped to shake his hand and wish him well. He smiled radiantly, as Louis XVI must have smiled in 1789. I sat down beside him. His bodyguard poised to strike, but the mayor said congenially, "Ah, Doctor Ingall, how are things at the mental health center?" I told him that it had been 18 years since I had been there, but congratulated him on his memory. I told him what Alex had said about him. He responded, "Ah yes, I remember that group." He proceeded to rattle off their itinerary through Europe from memory. I wished him well.
I returned to the apartment, still a hekdesh, made the bed, and slept for 12 hours. In the morning, I was paralyzed. I wandered from room to room, dazed. Later in the morning, Scott St. Germain, an old friend from Ocean State Outreach, came by. He had offered to lend some muscle for unpacking. I told him, "Scotty, we have to pretend I'm a patient at Ocean State Outreach and you are my case manager. I can't function. I don't know where to start. You have to direct and guide me. He did so. We set up the computer in the hutch from Jonathan & Marjorie's apartment. Behold, a miracle! Everything worked. I was on-line. We did some unpacking, enough to create enough space so that one could get through the apartment without climbing on boxes.
On Monday, I went to work, and in the evening, Carol returned, back safely from Israel. There are moments when you realize how much you really do love someone. For the next several nights, we ate out. We spent the early evening at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, in the Providence Place Mall next door, where Carol soon became a member of the family.
"Oh, hello, Carol, how are you today? What can I help you with?"
"Hi, Jim. What have you got in toilet brushes and easy-to-use can openers?"
"Did you want one tool, Carol, or two?"
It took over a month to finally get settled. On Sunday, August 4, at 2:00 PM, we finally finished. Everything was just the way we wanted it, and we were off to the Berkshires for the Brahms Requiem.
Today is August 26, and I'm finally finished with this page.
We love it here. It's like living on a boat. There are 180° gorgeous panoramic views of the new downtown Providence, with Waterfire and Waterplace Park at our feet and the river snaking out to Narragansett Bay. We can stand in the middle of our house and touch everything we own. The closets are full of gadgets to stow things away in compartments. It's light, bright, clean, quiet, and air conditioned. They deliver the papers to the front door of your apartment. If you need any fixing, drilling, hanging, they take care of it that day. The staff are very nice. At these prices they should be. No, at these prices, it's a bargain.
We don't miss our old house. We have fond memories of raising a family in a beautiful, gorgeous, warm and loving home. Those memories will never go. I still buy fruit and vegetables at Siravo's around the corner, and when I pass by the old house, I see a dumpster in the driveway, new windows going in, and, I'm sure, the kitchen being gutted and expanded, with a Subzero and a Jenn-Air in the island in the middle. Now, if they can have the joy and happiness and warmth and good friends that we had, they will be truly blessed. One thing I'm happy to leave them: the crazy Serbs next door and their two howling boxers.
