I can tell you exactly how it will go. I know because I've done it many times before. I will be in high anxiety packing. I will still be anxious in the cab. Then I will go through all the hassles of flying and will arrive late, after midnight. I won't recognize my own apt, it will seem brand new to me. And I will not sleep. I never sleep when I take a flight and arrive in a new or old place. I will be, if history is any guide, so relieved to be on the ground, and i will be excited even though I do not especially like my apt in South Beach and I won't sleep till 5 AM even though I have a 1:30 appointment for serious dental surgery. I will be tired but I will go. A friend will take me because I will be in pain and bleeding.

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However there is one way in which going to Florida, which is my legal and basic home for 7 days which will be different this time. Because? Because my time in New York since last Thursday has been hell on earth, beyond horrible,  totally depressing.  Since last Thurday at 6: 45 PM. What happened, well here's what did not:

I had a fantasy, a crazy but fun fantasy. I wrote about it here. It went like this: The Head of the Board, one Harry, might stall, hell he already stalled on letting me sell. Fantasy: I would go to the police station a block away and  demand that I be locked up because I was a danger to said Harry, and my powerful real estate agent would have all the media lined up and we'd have headlines in the sensationalist papers: Woman in Lock Down for Fury at Extortionist Coop Board.

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In this daydream, I had power. I was thinking outside the box and anyway I still believed the Board would not mess with this  buyer, who lives here, as I've said, is rich and etc. What happened was the exact opposite and I've been more miserable than makes literal sense  from the following  7 minute event:

I went for a walk at 6: 45 last Thursday. My ex had left until tomorrow. My daughter was coming in to fix up her new apartment, just around the corner. I  was feeling proud that I was walking daily /nightly even though my back hurts. I was as we say, 'in my own world.'

I pretty much collided with Harry at the exit doors which are the front doors. I could not believe it. I was back to thinking of him as an ally. The three doormen I know best gave a nod, a sorta thumbs up, as I went to follow Harry. He turned right on 82nd towards Columbus. He was, or pretending to be, in animated discourse on his cell.  I kept a nice distance; I was being polite. I wanted to talk to him about his former, years old, promise to never hold up a good sale even though the rest of the Board whose names I don't even know, probably don't like me.

So we got to the red light at Columbus. I was confused about the etiquette here. He was talking or pretending to, but I had my one chance to find out what happened at the Wed night meeting where our sale was on the agenda.  Harry had seen me. I was standing near, not next to him. (What I'd later think most unfortunate.) The police station was right across the way. I wasn't thinking of that. I was thinking of the fact that the Board had met and I wanted to know if it was a Yes. 

Harry knew if we had gotten through or not. The buyer's lawyer was pretty pissed but she made some deal with the Board about the extra monies they would take from the buyer.  I had all this on my mind. I was dying to talk to my neighbor, Harry, the only person on the Board who had talked to me, & promised me.  He was still on the phone.

Before the red light turned, I said in a moderate, not loud voice, "Harry!" as he stood in front of me. I still was a few feet behind him. He turned, stopped talking, and scowled at me with more hate than I have ever received in all my years. And then, he swatted his left hand along with his arm, four times in a row.

The pantomime meant: Get Away Get Away Get Away Get Away. Had I been closer he would have hit me, and then I would have had a case.

But no, unlike my power fantasy, I was weak.  He crossed the street with this horrid look on his face, as I waited for the next light. I stood there and he turned left and then, still with his phone to his right ear, he stopped to see me,  catty-cornered on 82nd and he gave me the fuck you middle finger  along  with a vibe so hostile;  his face  distored with hate. 

I do not do well when people scream at me. This was worse than that.

I moved through the next green light went past Columbus a few feet toward Amsterdam. As soon as I was out of sight, I sat on a stoop where he couldn't see me and I sobbed and sobbed. At that moment, I knew they were going to screw me and the buyer. That I may never get out of this building. Or will only get out without a fair payment. They can extort from me, and  I need that money, as I didn't before 07.

Far worse things have happened to me but I took this harder than I usually do. I usually beleive that for every problem (not of deathly magnitude) there is a solution.

Of course, I have had  worse problems and  never lost my active spirit. I don't know why this encounter hit me so hard. As I sat on that stoop, I felt my back, which is a problem lately, scoliosis and a slipped disc that hurts moderately and only when I walk, slipped further and the whole right side of my body/ right leg went into sciatica. It was the stress.

I called my lawyer because my realtor's number never gets into my cell. My lawyer is a great friend, not like any lawyer I've ever met and we talked about how of course anyone would have a psychosomatic response to these endless hassles. To be treated so rudely. We talked about macacbre fantasies, and he make me laugh.

I hobbled home and none of the doormen/deskman , all of whom are my friends, said a word. Fear pervades this place. With my ex gone for a few days and my friend who lives here gone too and my daughter not yet home, which home is not here anymore, this place felt as always, but worse,  so isolating, so wrong, so lonely and the notion that I might never leave had me hysterical.  I had no sensible ideas of what to do. Where was my Plan B? Where were all the friends, powerful ones, who lived here? All had moved out. I thought how even the doormen, afraid of the Board, didn't not console me as I sobbed walking in. Misery actually doesn't get much company.

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For every problem there is a solution. This notion, long in coming , has kept me excellent c ompany. I once lost all my hair and I do not have the shape head to look good bald. It was a reaction to insulin. I figured out the solution. It was eventually fine, and then my hair grew back, o so slowly. I didn't freak, I got active. This amazed me. That's when I formulated my motto: for every problem, a solution. I felt like I was on the far side of the moon, no one I could or would  talk to, no more friends in the building, no more hope. And flashbacks of Harry, sinister.

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I had a week-end from hell. I couldn't watch TV which never helps anyway because my dd took the main tv, the other in my ex's room is tiny and I had to sit on the floor to watch HBO, gave up and read three books all the way through. My daughter only dropped by for an hour. My friend had parties all week-end. My sweetie-pie from Israel called and he was in a bad way too and I suddenly knew that living with him, I'd have to carry all the energy. This left a bad feeling. I really could not even tell him. (You see, I'm generous to everyone but in order to do that I need the money from this apt.) I told him when both of us are upset it's impossible to talk. Then he seemed in my mind, even less powerful than myself, and surely less energetic in the world.

 I have never felt so alone in my life. Every action seemed impossible. Every person seemed covered in soot. The world felt very very far away. I emailed the realtor who I don't really trust. He's busy with the mega-rich, mostly the mega-famed. I told him, the only revelatory moment that my life has been dedicated to fighting injustice. But for myself, I don't have that energy. The emailed was returned as non-deliverable. I was never more lonely. My daughter had moved out, I was stuck.

I read,  all Saturday and Sunday, all day and night, first "After Long Silence" by Helen Fremont, then "The Selected letters of Martha Gellhorn", and finally,  Dave Cullen's "Columbine" a fine read, but since I was lying on my bed, and since I can't stop reading any book, my back went out. I couldn't go outside because I'm agoraphobic in NYC and I was miserable. (Thanks, Dave, a great read.) I wasn't reading as usual for pleasure but for escape. If I stopped I might panic. So I didn't stop.

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The world looks very gray as it actually is this Monday and I will leave for Florida in a few hours, and there I may or may not get new ideas or forgettabout the nightmare NYC coop has become. But I will have to come back for Eddie, for emptying this place, whether or not it sells. I won't have money be to go to Israel but then I'll figure something out.  Or find someone to share this problem to which I've told no one. Now to pack. I wish I was going to Toronto and not stormy or humid hot Miami. But I'm betting on the Geographic Cure which usually turns me on my ear.  A whole new way of being. Eventually, I'll come back and maybe by then, I'll be more pro-active.

The only good thing is that I learned what my epitath will read, "She fought injustice all her life." (What I won't say is that except when it is for myself.) Thanks for listening, if anyone does. This post is not well-framed but at least I could write something whereas over the week-end I could write absolutely nothing. Okay so here goes. Wish me luck.