Confessions of A Peanut Butter Junkie

Tony was up to no good. He lived at 810 1st Ave NW apt 2 Largo, FL 33770, and I was in the apartment next door. Number 1.
My name is Kenneth G. Donnelly, I’ve told you some of my story, but stick with me; because now it gets really good. I promise.
What makes you so sure Tony was up to no good you may be wondering. Did I see him hiding a body? Catch him in the rain with a length of rolled up carpet outside a public storage unit? Find his gun collection? His porn? What? What?
I know that Tony was up to no good because he lived next door to me and he never called the police. Not once. See I expected Tony to call the police on ME. And here’s why.
I would do really annoying stuff, like come home at 2 O’clock in the morning and blast my stereo just as loud as it would go. I had a Pioneer system that could crank out 150 watts of pure audio power and I had it cramped into an apartment that was smaller than most college dorm rooms. And Tony lived next door. I hate to admit it, but I did this a lot. I did it because I like loud music, and I wanted Tony to call the cops. He never did.
Not once.
My argument is simple. If he were not up to something devious, he would have called the cops. No one wants to hear their neighbor’s stereo or T.V. at 2 A.M. No one.
My name is Kenneth G. Donnelly and I lived in an apartment at 810 1st Ave NW apt. 1 Largo, FL 33770 from January of 2001 until October of 2005.
I called the place a dump. It was mostly just shabby. Run down on the outside. But it was nice on the inside. Small, but clean, and built like a fortress. I survived the 2004 hurricane season that included hurricanes Charley, Ivan, Frances and Jeanne there. I was not big on storm preparation. Couple of bottles of drinking water, a loaf of bread and some peanut butter was as far as I went.
But I’m rushing things, 2004 is hell and gone from January 2001.
Not long after I moved into the Westside apartments in January 2001, my neighbor Tony stopped by for a little visit. He actually asked to come into my apartment. Just wanted to see how I had it set up he said. I was neighborly, hell I was down right friendly and I let him right in. I knew Tony from when I worked at the Home Shopping Network from 1993 to 1996, but he was never my friend. Tony had been working the same job from 1993 to 2001 but was living in this dumpy apartment. What was he doing with his money? I couldn’t figure out why he hadn’t bought a house or a condo. I mean when you pay rent you’re just wiping your ass with good money right? He wasn’t going to school.
What was he up to?
Me, I was just about dirt poor. I really was. I was working for a temp agency at a place called TVC which is short for Tele Visual Communications at 300 South Duncan Avenue Clearwater Florida 33755. I think I was there for about six months or so. I took this job through a Temp agency. Today’s Temp? Kelly? I swear I’ve been with so many of these agencies that I can’t even tell you.
My family hadn’t given up on me yet, and when I talked with them the call to arms became, “Get a second job.”
What choice did I have?
I took another temp position with a company called Spherion and they put me to work for UPS-The Package People.
I started out at a hub where the little brown trucks are loaded and unloaded with packages. Fortunately for me my position was not as a loader, but as an auditor. I had this little scanner that strapped onto my wrist, it was a scanner just like the one at grocery store check out stands, only it strapped to my wrist, and all I had to do was scan as packages or boxes were being pushed, shoved or dragged down a conveyor belt.
This was the hottest place I have ever been to. I would sweat so much doing this that when I got off of work my clothes were literally drenched as if I had been in the rain. I had to put a plastic bag over the seat of my car to keep the seat clean.
I would work 8 hours over at TVC and then hustle on over to UPS for 4 or 5 hours in the evening. It wasn’t as bad as it sounds. I bet I lost 10 pounds in just the first week of working at UPS. And I was never a heavy guy to begin with.
Then the world changed. Admit it! It did. For me. For you. For everyone.
The morning of September 11, 2001 I was in the office of a temp agency. Today’s Temps?
Personnel One? I’ve been in so many of those offices it’s kind of a blur.
I’m sitting in this little waiting area and a girl in the back office says a plane just hit one of the buildings at the World Trade Center in New York. I think it’s bad, but not odd.
What I’m noticing more is this guy standing in the waiting area with me. He’s an old guy and I don’t know his name. And for some reason he wants me to notice him. I swear He does. I can remember his face, from when I was at Franklin Templeton. He seems more distressed than me when he hears about the plane.
But a few minutes pass and the girl pops out of the back office and says another plane hit the World Trade Center.
“You’re making that up. You read that on the internet,” I said.
She switched on a radio. It was just happening and the report was really vague. But I rushed out of the office. I had to get to a T.V. I was going to stop at a public place but all I could think of was bars and it was early in the morning so I just drove on home.
Now in a separate document I have told you that I love violent video games, and that I watch violent movies to. Horror movies. Nothing I have seen could prepare me for what was on T.V. the morning of September 11, 2001. In fact I was so shocked I had to call someone just to get a sense of … reality? Not sure what channel you were looking at, but on the one I was tuned to I could see people jumping from the 90th floor of the World Trade Center. Total system shock. I could not believe this was happening. You know the story. It kept getting more and more frightening as the morning dragged on. The field in Pennsylvania. The Pentagon. It was news. They showed the second plane crashing into one of the towers over and over again. And I watched. I cried on and off for more than two weeks. I couldn’t help it. Seeing people jump from way up there at the top of the Twin Towers, watching distraught relatives trying to find loved ones who would never be coming home. And it was all so strange. If I hadn’t seen it on T.V. I would not have believed it. I tell you, you couldn’t have sold that story to Hollywood had you made it up.
When I was working at Franklin Templeton I used to wear a cheap cologne called Gravity. You can get it a Wal-Mart. Someone once asked me why did I pick Gravity?
“Because Gravity kills,” I said. Always the super geek. Always the Irish Catholic mother fucker.
For me everything seemed to speed up after 9/11/01. I swear I could feel the world rotating, rushing around on its orbit. I would surf the internet for news. Listen to the T.V. and I kept feeling like I was making connections that other people weren’t.
And for the first time in my life I was truly lonely. For the first time in my life I really needed someone. I started to drink and smoke again. I started cruising singles bars.
Remember how I laughed at the tragic death of Payne Stewart? I still think of death as funny. You almost have to, don’t you? But seeing it like that, after 9/11 I guess sudden death just seemed so much more real.
Have you been to the Twin Towers? The World Trade Center? Manhattan?
I have. I was with my grandfather, a retired New York City police officer.
It was late November / early December 1985. I was no older than 18 or 19 at the time.
Made it up to the 107th floor indoor observatory. There was a high wind that day so we were not permitted out onto the outdoor viewing platform. I was a tourist. Not a terrorist!
Cars look like ants from that far up. They really do.
I could see lady liberty; she was busy getting a face lift at the time and was covered in scaffolding. Do you remember that?
Can you name anyone who died at the World Trade Center? I can.
Bucca. Google it. Go ahead. The name will pop up again later. I promise.
And then I caught a break. UPS moved me out to the St. Petersburg / Clearwater airport where they load and unload airplanes with packages. They are the package people after all. It was still pretty hot. Florida. What are you gonna do? But it was much smaller and if there was a breeze you had at least hope of catching some of it.
I left TVC, my full time job, it was a total and complete dead end. Through a temp agency I wound up at a place called Mercury Insurance, their based out of California, but I worked in their office located on Ulmerton Road in Clearwater Florida. I made my stand at Mercury. I was already over 30 years old and I was pretty sure this was it for me.
I was hired as an office clerk. They called it support specialist, but what ever. BI support specialist. The BI stands for Bodily Injury. I supported a group of 5 or 6 insurance adjusters and did menial tasks like make photo copies. Distribute departmental mail. Filing. My first boss was a guy named Gary Stone. He was in charge of the Bodily Injury dept. The BI dept.