The tired looking, wooden and brick structure sat perched atop a hill in a lower-middle class area of town. If not for the steady resistance of the pothole-filled parking lot, it may well have slid to the bottom of the embankment. .
It was a stone's throw away from the municipal golf course, which lent an air of uncertainty to the daily task of crossing the parking lot to the safety of apartment door. The protective nets strung across the balconies of the residences nearest the line of fire bore the tragic tale of unexpected golf balls crashing through plate glass in the middle of a peaceful dinner. Thankfully, my apartment was spared the ugliness of the net, but not much else.
It was a one-bedroom walk up, comfortably large for the price I was paying, yet full of the reminders of my social and earnings status at the time. It had ugly, well-worn carpet the color of Mississippi mud, hospital-white walls and a balcony the size of a postage stamp which had room for my bike and nothing more, not that I would have spent much time out there anyway. The view was less than spectacular. All you could see was the back of a neighboring row of apartments and the "lawn" in between, littered with blowing bits of trash .
and the occasional gang of kids cutting through on their way to some big.
Meehan 2.
adventure or petty crime.
In the still night air you could often hear the rumble of the diesels as they sped their way down the highway to destinations unknown. Likewise, the lonely whistle of the train as it clacked down the tracks in the distance would often put me to sleep. .
I sometimes slept with my windows open (one of the few benefits of having a second floor apartment), anxious to save as much money as I possibly could on my ever-increasing electric bill. The summer sun bore brutally down on the west side of my apartment, raising the temperature to boiler-room extremes. Ironically, my air conditioner compressor was located in the direct path of the sun, causing it to hum constantly as it labored to keep me comfortable.
