The Providence of Neighboring Bodies

Jean Ann Douglass

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781786825919
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Feminism & Feminist Theory
• Index: Social Sciences

An absurdist dark comedy on friendship and isolation from up-and-coming American playwright Jean Ann Douglass. It's an exciting day for Dora here in North Providence, Rhode Island. Today is the day Dora is going to make coffee, go outside, and make friends with Ronnie. Ronnie lives in the apartment next door, her balcony just adjacent to Dora's, both overlooking the parking lot and the weird hill across the street. Ronnie isn't keen to meet Dora, she's busy preparing her flat for AirBnb guests. She isn't sure how she wound up living in North Providence for all these years, but here they both are, where nothing exciting has really happened since the great beaver purge of the mid-20th century. That is, until Jane, Ronnie's first Airbnb guest shows up at her door. This dark, surreal comedy about beavers, beer, and balconies, explores female friendhip and the place we call home. As fest-mag writes: 'With new arrivals and historical homecomings, it asks who belongs where, who moves in, who moves on?' The Providence of Neighboring Bodies premiered in New York, and had its UK premiere at the 2018 Edinburgh Fringe.

We open with morning light.

DORA: I get up in the morning without an alarm. The sun streams into my bedroom in this really beautiful way that makes this part of the day so easy. Then from there, it’s over to the kitchen to put a kettle on the stove. While the water is heating up, I go for a pee, get out my foam roller, and do weight lifting with cans of soup that I keep on the counter for this very purpose.

The water boils and – ah ah ah! – I realize I forgot to grind the coffee. I do so, holding my finger on the button until the grinding changes its musical key. I am looking out the window. I do my best not to stare, even though I know she can’t see me, due to the fishbowl effect and it being lighter outside than it is in my kitchen, but I am afraid it’s rude to let my eyes linger too long on Ronnie, as she fusses in her balcony garden.

The coffee has been ground sufficiently for a good long time now, and I notice this with a start, and stop pressing the button. I pour the grounds into my french press, pour the water on top, slowly, allowing the coffee to bloom first. In my head I start considering what I will say when I take this press pot for two out to my balcony, notice she is there, and invite her to come sit on my respectable and only a bit outdated outdoor furniture.

I head back to the bedroom to change, and think better of it. It’s Saturday. It’s casual. A bathrobe is normal.
A bathrobe and a fresh swipe of eyeliner and a little lip tint and some sunscreen on my décolletage.

I grab the unpressed pot, a mug – just one, I don’t want to be presumptuous – and sway breezily onto the balcony, careful not to lay my eyes on Ronnie before I get there, lest it seem rude I don’t already have a mug for her.

I face my apartment as I press down the press pot, thinking ‘Oh, hell-o Ronnie!’ and ‘Oh! You startled me! I didn’t realize you were up so early’ and ‘Ronnie! Hi!’

I spin around smoothly with my eyes on my hands as I pour into my mug, and I cry ‘Oh! –’ and then stop, because no one is there.

RONNIE: I run the water at the sink, filling a mason jar for the flowers I just picked. Daisies frankly look a little stupid and cheap like this, but I have been doing my research, and shit like this is all the rage. Shabby chic, or whatever. Or at least I saw this really successful host several towns over doing this in their listing photos. So I went to Job Lot and found a jar – well, six jars really, but the prices there are so cheap it was better than buying one jar anywhere else – and have been waiting for my day off to retake this photo.

Directors are always saying on the director’s commentary tracks that the light is best in the early mornings, so here I am, up before I want to be on a Saturday, picking flowers to put in mason jars, camera at the ready.

You know, they advertise to hosts that they’ll send a professional photographer to your place, free of charge? Quality control, and all that. I wrote in to ask about it – ‘just email us to ask about it’ – and a few minutes later they wrote back to turn me down. They need to focus their resources on areas with great tourism potential for the time being, and hope to be able to accommodate my request soon.

So here I am at 7:15 on a Saturday morning, new camera in hand. Positioning a daisy just right. Adjusting the blinds just right.

Sighs.

Ronnie, this better fucking work.

DORA: Two cups of coffee for me then! That’s fine. No big deal. This could have been my intention all along. I do love coffee. I’ve been trying to limit myself to one cup, more than that can make me anxious, irritable, in this way that even B vitamins can’t shake me out of. But what’s the harm in it now? I already went grocery shopping for the weekend. It’s Saturday. If I get a little irritable, so what? Really. So what? Maybe sitting here on my balcony, irritable, will feel good for a change. It’s good to change your perspective every once in a while, and I’m looking at All. That. Coffee…and it feels good to be bad. It feels good to think about drinking All. That. Coffee and how sour I’ll feel. Sour and bitter like this thick, tart brew, with its grainy finish right at the end. Right when you least expect it to stick between your teeth. To coat your tongue. Muck as a final tasting note to all this pleasure. That’s me. By noontime I’ll be the muck. I’ll coat your tongue. I’ll be proud of it. I’ll brag. I’ll shout it from this balcony: I AM THE MUCK! DORA IS THE MUCK! And people in the parking lot will look up at me, but I won’t even notice because I’ll be too busy staring at the sky, clutching my railing to save me from blasting off like a spaceship.

I am holding my first cup, and eyeing the press pot. It’s filled with all the coffee I have left to drink when this cup is done. I hardly even see the coffee in my cup, I’m so blinded by my desire for cup number two. But I stay strong and remember to savor it. I want to feel the change, notice it sip by sip.

RONNIE: It’s not that it’s not focused, it is. And the camera is brand new, with new batteries. I even put it on the counter to take the photo. And I know that is not the same as a tripod, but you don’t need a tripod when you have counters and hardcover books. They’ll always try to upsell you, but the human race got along fine without tripods for thousands of years.

No matter what I do, these pictures don’t look quite right.

My students just get this stuff. The other day I was trying to show a video in my class, but instead of the video, there were all these numbers on the screen, and I had three remotes, and all of them had rows and rows of numbers and symbols, circle buttons and rectangle buttons, with textures so some of them feel different, so what, I can train to use it blindfolded? So I never need to look away from the screen?

I had to catalog how ridiculous these were, and I started to count the number of buttons on the remotes. How many of each type. How many on each remote. I needed to know.

It must have been taking me longer than I thought because one of my students asked if I was alright. I ...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Characters
• Contents
• Chapter 1