MY DAY, THIS DAY

OPEN WARFARE

The notice in the lift said the communal electrics – corridor lights, stair lights, laundry, lift – would be down, switched off from nine-thirty this morning while a new meter was installed. ‘Sorry for any inconvenience,’ it said, ‘The Caretaking Team.’
When I opened the door to the laundry, half expecting my fob not to work – having read the new rules CT’d taped on the wall above the rinsing sinks, ‘There’s space there,’ I’d said last week pointing,’ that informed users of the laundry that fobs would only work at each persons allotted time, she jumped from the seat, surprised.
‘Only me,’ I said. ‘Thought I’d get in early before the cut off.’
‘Oh,’ she said, ‘yes.’
‘Not much privacy there,’ I said, nodding at the bench where she’d sat back down.
The bench had been moved a few weeks ago and she said the last time I’d seen her here and asked her if she knew why it’d been moved.
‘Someone complained,’ she said.
‘How many’d it take?’ I said.
We agreed that the bench’s new position was both exposing and inconvenient as being where it was now meant it was in full view of the fifth floor entrance and a folding table had been moved in the far corner from the dryer.
When I got back later to pick up my washing Olive was still there even though she’d said, ‘I’ll probably be gone,’ when I said, ‘See you later,’ when I’d left after checking the wash had taken. She was folding her mostly pastel coloured clothes, though she wore her usual dark polyester slacks.
‘I put it in the dryer,’ she said of my wash. ‘It’d finished, so I thought I’d put it in the dryer,’ slightly defensive, concerned…Had she done the right thing?
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Thank you,’ reassuring.
I started taking my damp clothes out of the dryer and dropping them without folding into my laundry bag.
Behind me Kay, with the hennared hair and facial piercings, was loading a couple of the washers.
‘You do know about the electric going off at nine-thirty?’ I said.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Oh, no, are they?’
Olive got up having finished folding and packing her wash in her trolley and said, ‘I’m off.’
‘Bye now,’ I said, then turned back to Kay. ‘You’ll have time for the wash,’ I said, ‘but you’ll have to mke your own plans for drying.’
‘When’s it back on?’ she said. ‘How long’s it off for? I could come down after…’
‘If you do you’ll have to stay with it because you’ll be in someone else’s time and they might take it out or worse,’ I said, ‘I’ve had things nicked form here before.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘You take someone’s time it’s like open warfare.’


AFTER BREAKFAST, BEFORE LUNCH

On my way out down by lift, CT was there wiping the walls.
‘Getting out before the electric goes off?’ he said.
‘I’m off to work,’ I said. ‘That’s why I was in the laundry earlier, get it done.’
…a couple of floors passed...
‘How long’s it off for?’ I said. ‘A few hours?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said, and turned to read the notice. ‘It doesn’t say,’ what I knew already, ‘Inconvenient though.’
They do apologise for that,’ I said.
‘Even so,’ he said, ‘why couldn’t they do it after everyone’s at work and after the kids are at school?’
‘Indeed,’ I said, what I say when I don’t know what else to say.
As I walked out the block I thought that from nine-thirty for a few hours was minimally inconvenient for the civilised amongst us flat dwellers as it was both after breakfast and before lunch.