Openthedoor-man

Okay, so I confessed to selling weed at one point in my life.

What can I say?

As recently as a year and a half ago, I used to get a lot of complaints about hallways that smelled like ashtrays, or cigarette butts tossed onto another resident’s window sill below.

Maybe because a lot fewer people smoke cigarettes nowadays (or they're just not doing it inside their apartments), most smoke complaints now are about weed.

For instance, a handful of residents constantly ask me to ask whomever it is on whatever floor to put a towel at the bottom of their door in order to keep the smell inside their apartment.

I hate to admit it, but we doormen can be more critical and judgmental of women than we are of our bros’. Call it a double standard, battle of the sexes, or simply the laws of attraction.

We don’t go out of our way to behave in this manner, it just happens.

Here’s a look through our eyes:

I once knew a gentleman who said to me, “Yesterday’s history, tomorrow’s a mystery, today’s a gift and that’s why we call it the present.”

As a doorman, I am constantly reminded of that as I watch the cycle of life unfold all around me.

I watch once vibrant and smiling men and women in the building, in the neighborhood, next door--those who walked with swagger and rapid strides, who prepared religiously for the marathon every year, and people who were passionate about certain causes and were very vocal in their opinions—deteriorate before my eyes.

It’s almost Memorial Day, which means the official start of summer is just around the corner.

For a doorman, that’s good and bad news.
 

5 great things about summer:

1. R.I.P.: As the city quiets down, so do buildings. There is often just one renovation going on in the building versus 3 or 4 different ones, each with their own construction crew.

When it comes to getting things fixed around the apartment, men of all kinds--from single to married, straight to gay, young to old--can be just as needy as some women.

They come to the super, porter or doormen for help with the tiniest of jobs.

Plunging a toilet, tightening a doorknob, removing a dead mouse from an apartment (on a glue trap no less), loading a car.

Changing a 60-watt light bulb.

I mean, seriously.