The Curse of the Baby Jesus

Hello, friends. This is one of those "I told you that story so I could tell you this one" moments.

First, though, I just finished knitting something that involves non-knitting construction. It is a tablet pyramid, but without the foam or poly-fil, it looks like a really depressed throw pillow. So, there is that.

So, in order to read today's post, you need to catch up on a post from 10 years ago. The Original Baby Jesus Story can be found here. I recommend reading it before going any further.

"Life-sized Baby Jesus" has been a haunting theme in my life for decades. I am Catholic, but I am the generation after the Guilt Catholics, so I can have a bit more lighthearted of a sense of humor about the stiffness of the church. It turns out, so can my mom and my aunt.

Also, my friend PJ, who is mentioned in the other blog post, has found that the phrase is an accurate depiction of life in the front yard of Chicago homes, vivid enough to be used to describe a horrific scene at Midway Airport. The phrase does not have to be humorous to be compelling.

My aunt is visiting from Florida this week, and it is more of a power-visit, racing against the clock to get their genealogy papers in order. I of course volunteer to help, whenever this comes up. I have a subscription to newspapers.com, and it is the best $150 per year I spend, including 7-Eleven coffee every morning. I looked up obituaries for them.

What made this super-duper fun is that they were looking up the Drzastwa family, so of course I got to flex my Duolingo Polish muscles. And by "flex," I mean that I could pronounce the words correctly and then say something like, "Ooh...this is the social page and the report says they were visiting friends out-of-town!" It felt like a hell of an accomplishment to learn enough of a Slavik language in a year and a half to do that.

Over the weekend, I opened the cabinet with the garbage can, so I could throw something away. Amid the papers on the dining room table going to a shredder box, and all of the organized piles of things they were keeping placed neatly in a line along one side, the garbage can held an interesting treasure. Sticking out from the side of the plastic bag was a bejeweled crown. I figured it was a silly old liquor bottle from the 1970's. Oh, no...friends, it was a porcelain Infant Jesus of Prague doll.

I walked down the hall with it in my hand. Jesus was missing one jewel from his crown, and his blessing hand had broken off, so there was a gaping hole in his right side (of course, Jesus would be depicted as both white and right-handed...why make him the Israeli lefty that he most likely was?). I see my mom and my aunt walking toward me, so I gestured to the statue. "Was this the one from Aunt Starlene, or the one from your mom?"

And...the can of emotional worms was open. This post should have come with a trigger warning, sorry.

My mom unintentionally raised her voice. "No, no...oh no. This is a third one! You should have heard me when I opened the damn box and found this thing...it was like, 'Are you kidding me?'"

So, take away the humor for a second. This is a box my mom most likely had opened in the past. It was full of her parents' financial records, other genealogical copies, and old photos. But, behold! Yet Another Infant Jesus Of Prague! Hence, the curse. I can trace the other two, but this one, I am certain, was plopped in there by a dead relative, and it was their way of saying "quit reading our Polish-language obituaries already."

Well, it turns out there was an entire box of Catholic shit accompanying this doll, including his Liberace-style regalia, clearly handmade with love and gorgeous stichery, if you could separate the fact that it is used to dress a porcelain religious figure with only one hand. 

There was a blessing from the Pope, most likely brought by Father Tom when he was visiting from California (he was my great uncle). There was a blessing from the Pope for my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary. 

There were rosaries upon rosaries upon rosaries.

There were two random medals, Our Lady of Olives, and Our Lady of Mount Carmel. We do not know their purpose in my grandmother's life, but there must have been one.

And...then there was the last photo, below. The item in the bottom left contains a seven-foot long rosary in the twist-off portion of the bottom. Then, there is the cross, the teeny Infant Jesus of Prague (I think...might be a Cardinal), the personal holy-water thermos on the right (there is a proper name for that, too), and then the thing at the top.

The item at the top is some sort of dildo-shaped box with pop-open doors, and Jesus appears like a music box to pray at you or something. What is amazing about this item is it can also be found in Joel Dovev's book, Crap At My Parents' House. Joel, I feel you.

I reached out to my friend Father Jim, who is a priest in the city. He already knew about the two original baby Jesus dolls, because when I was in his rectory once, he jokingly asked if I wanted a life-sized bust of Pope John Paul II, so I explained to him that my mom would LOVE it. The Pope landed in Mom's freezer, and it took her a few weeks to find him. 

As you may have read above, my mom was not too pro on throwing out Baby Jesus, but this third one was akin to Phoebe trying to get rid of the beeping smoke alarm on the television show "Friends." I understand why it was in the trash. I asked Father what the proper way of disposing of a porcelain Infant Jesus of Prague doll with a broken and missing blessing hand was (it should be noted that my aunt looked for the missing blessing hand in the box, and it was not there; further proof this was just a curse from a dead Polish relative). He said that the proper way was to destroy it and bury the dust.

Well. The can of worms was suddenly an art project.

This turned into the highlight of my aunt's trip. They went up to my mom's "wooden house" in Michigan, and when I called to ask what their plans were, they had really done their due diligence on how to contain Jesus' pieces. They had discussed how to keep the dust contained, how to get the larger pieces into smaller pieces for easy burial, and the best type of earth in which to bury the dust. Their original plan was to roll over it with the car.

I liked that idea, but with a house like that one, I also felt they were missing a golden opportunity to toss it off of a loft. 

Friends, here is the ceremonial pulverization of the Third Infant Jesus of Prague, in three parts. It was not smooth sailing, as it turned out; the head was on some sort of "wire lollipop." Enjoy.

https://youtu.be/QGzZuxuCIQg

https://youtube.com/shorts/FtWXUSogxJY

https://youtu.be/NU9OajXv9uo

Oh...and please, pray for us.

Dear Mister and Missus Landlord

 

Well, gosh...have I got a story for you. (Not really. My life is not terribly sensational. But I had a teachable moment, anyway.)

So, first, I have had this Zauerball Crazy yarn for probably eight years. I love it. I love to look at it, squeeze it, dream of what it could become, all of it. I recently started thinking, "You know what I need? old-school 1980's legwarmers!"

FYI:  nobody at all needs those. But in my defense, I have no thyroid, I have lost a lot of weight, and I work in a seventy-five year old building with a drafty set of windows. So there they are, below...I knit them in bed on many nights.

That said, I am part of a growing group - unofficially and with no charter or real name, for that matter - called Former Republicans Currently Without Party. The people I know of this ilk are generally money-minded white people, and before extremism literally took over politics, their determination of who gets their vote would be a balance between who handles money the best, and who handles people the best. As this rise of extremism has taken over the discourse, more and more of us can say with confidence that we want nothing to do with the "new" Republicans or the "new" Democrats. There is no party for the middle, and please read this sentence that follows as often as you need:

Neither Libertarians nor Andrew Yang is the answer to the bipartisan but directionless mush, currently swimming in our two-party system.

I have said that I will vote for Hunter Biden's Laptop before voting for Trump in 2024.

So, my story is actually a landlord story. Landlords have had a pretty brutal two years. All of the programs offered in housing were geared toward renters. Renters could apply for aid (but it was not required), landlords could not evict, and now that the eviction moratorium has expired, the eviction records from that time period have been sealed. Background checks have literally gone out the window.

I hate the word "Landlord." I use it because people use it to me, but it just sounds so English and misogynist. So, property owners were given relief, but the basis of the pandemic programs seemed to be that people who own property are rich, and people who rent property had no money in the bank. We were given a four-month forbearance option, meaning we could go up to four months without paying our mortgages, and then we would have to pay it all at once at the end of the time period or risk losing our homes.

My perspective on property investment has changed a bit in this time period. I have a six-flat in Westmont where I have a friend do background checks for me, but I am up-front with the prospective tenants. "Tell me what I am going to find," I say, "and I will take it into consideration."

First rule with this is if the person blames the former landlord for not fixing things, there is likely something going on with the tenant not paying their rent. Not to say there are no slumlords out there, but landlords do have an obligation to keep people safe, and that includes keeping their tenants safe. It is in their best interest to fix broken things, whether or not the tenant has paid. Landlords know this. So this is a red flag.

Second rule is that everyone has a past. See how things are being paid now, today, and not how things were paid seven years ago. Of course the past can indicate the future, but if you can't smell a bullshitter talking about their spending, and then you do a current-home visit (allowed by law in IL) and can't see the piles of hoarded or expensive crap and a sense that they need to be out before they are subpoenaed, then this is not the profession nor the hobby for you.

So yes, I do background checks. Yes, I verify income. Do I disqualify people for everything I used to? No. I do, however, try to imagine how someone would fit in one of the units inside a six-flat, as a member of a community with the other tenants. If someone gives me an indication that they "keep to themselves and never make noise," I am here to tell you that they start shit and always make noise. They do not belong in a building with five other groups of kids who currently do not have the money to buy their own place.

I got an instant message from a woman who said she was looking for an apartment, and I asked what her situation was. She told me she was recently divorced and looking to move with her 20-year-old kid, and that her condo complex now allowed Section 8 and it is not "safe" anymore.

I asked her where she lived now, where the complex allows Section 8. After all, I get asked on a regular basis about our complex, and Dupage County does not have many places where it is accepted. Maybe I could help someone down the road.

Her response was that she knows nothing about that (like, she doesn't know where she lives?), and that she is just stating that these low income people have also made the area low class.

My message back to her was plain and simple. "Then I'm sorry but I am not interested in renting my apartment to you. I wish you all of the fortune in your search!"

Well, what happened next was a bit of a surprise. Sorry to make this sound like clickbait, but, "WHAT HAPPENED NEXT WILL TRULY SURPRISE YOU! (click here)"

She replied that, no problem, but may she ask if she offended somehow? She is not on Section 8 and maybe could have explained herself better.

In other words, she tripled down on telling me that groups of Section 8 housing are low class.

She said that about a year ago, five of the buildings in her area started accepting Section 8 (mind you, I still do not know where she lives). She said the lifestyle and class of people have changed, meaning now that area can be unsafe at night, loud ruckus, and the police have to patrol the area. She told me she chooses not to reside with indigent people that don't work for a living and live off the state. Then she threw in her credit score, I guess as a hook in a really deep pond.

I took this as a teachable moment. Here is my response to whether she offended me somehow, word for word.

"Thanks for asking, Chris. Happy to explain. I have a sec 8 tenant in the city. She has been there for eleven years, and three hours before your message, the last thing she and I said to each other was "I love you." My six-flat in Westmont has a convicted felon, immigrants, people of color rebuilding after bankruptcy, someone who was screwed by their slum lord, a family of fast-food-chain managers, and a DREAMer. I feel strongly in getting a feeling for all tenants in the building getting along, so they can be their own mini- neighborhood-watch when crime occurs. I just feel if you think that all sec 8 voucher holders are trash, then you would not be compatible in the building, personality-wise. Is there anything I can do to help you in your apartment search?"

It should be noted that I made the decision to change how I ran my business after bringing someone in whose previous landlord filed eviction on her four days after she moved into my place. The bottom line is, you just have to get to know people.

The Republican in me would have taken her money because she has a good job and decent credit score. The Democrat in me did not like the fact that she hates a bunch of nameless, faceless people and felt that a police patrol is actually a bad thing. This is why I am without party.

Related: does anyone want to buy my house at 2251 N Laporte Ave in Chicago? It is a great starter home, a great investment if you wanted to rent it or rehab it to make it bigger (both the basement and attic can be expanded), or it is just a nice place to land if you feel you need a change.

We all need a change right now. I started with my outlook. Where will you start?