Someone like Virginia

Virginia had been in her 70s at the time that I knew her, she lived next door in the same ratty apartment complex that I did.

A lot of "interesting people" in transient had lived in the old place over the decades going from one job to the next so you never really knew your neighbors very long.

Mostly down and out oil field trash back in the days when the big oil money was still rolling in at an insane rate, when many people had more money than brains, and were willing to prove it over and over and over again. Fortunes, properties and sometimes even marriages were lost in poker games, strip clubs and a line of brothels that dotted downtown Anchorage, dilapidated derelicts left over from the booming pipeline days.

Some of the tenants that lived in my building were on their way up in the world and some were on their way down, struggling with addiction, divorce or working two jobs and attending night courses in college to better themselves and then moving onward and upward - far AWAY from the dilapidated apartment building, dirty street corner and dinged up cars that were always scattered hap-hazzardly across the litter strewn parking lot.

The apartment building had always been a melting pot of humanity that was actually quite fascinating with its revolving influx of people and dialects.

Some were specialized technicians on temporary assignment, usually oil related, there were transient exotic dancers drawn to the ridiculous amounts of money that were being squandered nightly by over the hill Teamsters, dope dealers and occasional Confidence man who would spend his days moving bogus stocks and real-estate scams throughout Alaska during that time.

Yet in a strange way it all seemed to work out and most everyone got along in the place. The land lord was an old retired cop who knew how to bang heads when need be but seldom did it ever come to that. People just kind of minded their own business and tried to survive as best they could.

It was 1989, just after the Exxon Valdez and work was good for me and I was seldom ever home except to find a shower and a bed and keep the steady line of paper work churning up ward and beyond to the great powers that be.

In my absences the old building had seen numerous dope busts, one shoot out, endless domestic drunkenness and all the other fringe benefits associated with low income housing occupied by chemically dependent and unstable people with no money or too much money and nowhere else to go. If you had a place to stay in Anchorage during the winters of the 80s and 90s, you were lucky - Any place.

Much younger then, none of it really mattered to me and I'd seen the show a hundred times before in a hundred other places, I came home tired and went to work early so none of it really affected me one way or the other.

Virginia was a nice enough lady, slightly eccentric in a way but always willing to lend a hand or help a neighbor in need. I remember her as somewhat shy, somewhat talkative and always wearing fire-engine RED, RED lip-stick and smoking EVE cigarettes, I never saw her without one.

Virginia was older but always out and about the premises and mixing with people, I suspect it was part loneliness and part curiosity on her part to see what the people living around her were doing.

The old cop and I had talked some of her and even quipped a few jokes back and forth about how she was hot to trot for the younger guys around the building, which really she was in a way I think.

Other than that I was working the oil spill then and never really had much time to pay any attention to her, the cop or anyone else in the building, I really didn't care who lived there one way or the other. I'd only see my neighbors in passing to and from the mailbox or laundry room from one week to the next, one trip to Valdez to the next, it all kind of blurred together at some point and a person lost track of time.

This was when personal electronic technology was in its infancy, the internet really didn't exist to speak of and beepers were just starting to come on line but weren't yet reliable or nearly plentiful enough.

In those days a guy would leave Anchorage at midnight with a load of drill casing and was told to call when he got to Valdez the next morning for further instructions on what to bring back, land-lines were the order of the day then.

I came home off the road one evening, late, and shortly after sitting down in my living room got a call from my boss, he said that Id most likely pull out and head for Kenai in the morning. He then told me that I needed to be by the phone in case things changed (which they always did.)

I turned on the TV to wait for his call when I remembered that I hadn't dropped off an important document at our Anchorage terminal, I knew that it was imperative that I delivered the document that night so the paper pushers could get started on it the next morning. I called my boss right back several times but got no answer...what am I gonna do now? I knew as soon as I stepped out of my apartment that he'd call with instructions for the morning.

I thought about it and I finally went to Virginias door and asked if she wouldn't mind to sit by my phone for 45 minutes and explained my situation. I had been to her apartment once or twice to lift things that were too heavy for her and so she was happy that she could help me for a change, she only asked if she could smoke.

I dropped off the document and was home within 30 minutes, in the meantime my boss had in fact called and cancelled my trip until the following Monday, Virginia told me.

Relieved at the idea of extra sleep I bid Virginia good night and was about to show her to the door and "get rid of her" when just out of the blue I asked if she'd like to stay for a quick cup of coffee?

Virginia sipped her coffee and smoked while she told me that she was Norwegian and had come from a small farming community in the Mid West, she hadn't liked small town life and moved to the big city in her late teens. An attractive girl she had landed some small time modeling jobs in New York City and even did a few TV commercials later. For a short time she had been a dancer in Vegas and at one point had been on magazine back covers in cigarette adds.

She had hob-knobbed with some of the big stars of the time (her time) and could possibly have even been in the movies but then she had met an Air Force Major and had gotten married, Virginia had been married 4 times and out lived them all...

Virginia had lost loved ones in WWII, Korea and Viet Nam yet she wasn't bitter about life, she didn't hate anything or hate anyone, dislike some things or some people yes but not hate.

Her kids, now grown and gone and for the most part uncommunicative were out of her life.

She had a little money coming in and had lived on and off cruise ships for the last 20 years or bumped around from town to town looking for old friends, most of whom had long since passed-on or moved away into the oblivion of suburban America.

Tiring somewhat of cruising at 70 Virginia had followed the rest of the flock to Alaska for a lark. She loved the mountains and the Native peoples she had met and said she wanted to explore the Aleutian Islands where her brother had been stationed during WWII.

Virginia was a murderous scrabble player, a veracious reader and also liked to write some herself, often admitting her stories into contests hosted by various magazines, some were western short stories while others were erotic in nature. She let me read some of her submitted stories and a few were actually quite good.

I was intimate with Virginia that night and several to follow, I enjoyed it.

Work in the oil fields slowed for a time and we were able to share with each other on more than a superficial basis.

Virginia was a deep and loving person and very intelligent. I believe that I'm a gentler and less judgmental person after meeting her and learning about what she had experienced in her life.

Work picked up again, people moved in and people moved out of that rat infested place and eventually I too, moved on to bigger and better things, I left the oil field and invested my earnings instead of squandering it. I got back into good physical shape.

I built a small business and have become moderately successful and I enjoy life now.

Yet sometimes when I'm alone and its quiet, my mind will drift back to the time I lived in a dumpy old apartment building and I remember a special lady that lived in Apartment # 3.

Peace be with you wherever you are lady...