Dear Betty: the landlord not to be,
I am sorry we had the opportunity to meet.
Oh wait, we didn’t really meet. Sure, we had a great phone conversation and you loved me from behind the cell phone. You heard a well-spoken women talking about moving into your apartment with her firefighter husband and honor roll student son.
Betty, you heard me talk about working as a preschool teacher and holding my job at the VMFA for fifteen years. You heard me say we were selling a house to get into the right school district so you knew we had some means and were trying to do the right thing for our family.
You couldn’t wait to meet that woman.
But when you pulled up that day and saw my husband and I, you couldn’t wait to get out of there. Our conversation drifted away like a puff of dirt because indeed my husband was covered in dirt. He left his second job doing lawns to meet you.
All of the sudden the idea of us having a kid wasn’t heartwarming it was repellant and you quickly told us that a third party was not allowed as you shuffled us out of there within two minutes flat.
By the way, we didn’t want your place. It was small and clean but it had no character.
And while we are speaking of character
Let’s acknowledge this. YOU were late, very late. We would never be late because we are responsible and we are kind and we value other people’s time. That’s who we are. But you wouldn’t know that, Betty. You didn’t care, because all you saw was dirt and tattoos and the beat up cars we drove.
At first I was mad at you Betty but mostly I feel sorry for you. You will never have the opportunity to know my lovely family. You will never get to admire my husband’s work ethic or my love of children or Donovan’s witty repartee unless of course you have a fire or I wait on you at the VMFA or my son becomes the lifeguard at your pool.
Maybe then, Betty, you will wish you had been kinder but you shouldn’t worry because we aren’t like you. We serve all people the same, we treat all people the same, no matter what they look like or how they have acted. It’s called being a professional. It’s called being a good human being. It’s called giving someone a chance.
You have plenty of years left and I hope you learn this simple lesson I’m working on with my own son.
“Don’t judge a book by its cover,” because, Betty, there might be a beautiful human being might be lurking beneath, you never know.
Sincerely,
Rebecca and my three beautiful human beings
About Rebecca Suder