Romy and I have been living with Winter and Nic in the “Ghost Olympics,” a rental on Jay st.

Nic spends a good deal of time in the “Loungery room,” where he has set up a desk, two chairs, several book shelves of poetry, records, and his J-Pop collection. It is also the laundry room. The kitchen is “Dishtopia” and it is home to our kombucha mother, “Jack Jr.” In the dining room there is a big pile of crap, which is a constant reminder that to ever be at peace in a dwelling I should live alone.

I’ve pretty much got Romy trained on minimalism. She and I share bedroom where we have 2 beds and 4 plants. The living room has come under my jurisdiction and most of what it contains is space. I hung paintings, added plants and brought a vintage-modern 60’s couch. My favorite piece of furniture is an up-turned troth that I picked up from a Whole Foods dumpster. The “Trothy Table” goes well with a painting from my mom’s rust series. Deguer, the bird, is caged in the living room. I’ve seen him out once or twice and I’ve seen Winter or Nic talking to him once or twice, but he mostly functions as captive decoration.

Most of the hanging out occurs on the ever-degrading front porch, which looks onto our ever-improving yard. My dad gave us a tomato plant, a jalapeño plant, bell peppers and morning glories along with a hose attachment. The landlady, “RaeRae” gave us drought resistant plants.

During our first night at the Ghost Olympics we made friends with the neighbors. Fabian is a 20 something hairstylist who lives with his dad, Gerald, and occasionally comes over to sit on our front porch and drink Budweiser Clamados. Gerald brought a ladder on 4th of July and we watched fireworks from the roof. He listens to Hard Rock on Big 98.5 loudly and consistently as we are falling asleep and calls us “the kiddos.”

“H” or “Bones” and his friend: “Beef” live down the road and know about where to find the most pure cocaine. Another man mysteriously showed up in our house the first night and was intent on complimenting the beauty of every female in the vicinity.

In our parking lot alone there are many houses, including a family with a ferocious guard Chihuahua (“Bruno”), another gay/trans couple, and the guy who drives a Mini Cooper and never waves. At least this was the lore, one day I waved at the guy and he smiled and waved back.

The Ghost Olympics is a nice house and its mailbox contains a list of our psuedonyms but soon it won’t contain us. When Romy’s visa expires I intend on living in a palace of my own neurosis.