Everything I Need to Know I Learned from Dungeons & Dragons (14 page)

Water damage is the cancer of architecture. It can lead to all sorts of fun things like mold, rot, collapsed foundations, and above all else, panic. For the first time in the thirteen years I lived there, we had 100% turnout at a meeting, mostly due to the two words on the meeting agenda: Potential Assessment.

Skip, the homeowners association president (and keeper of
the worst
volunteer job in America), made sure we all had a copy of the engineer's report before the meeting. Not being an engineer myself, I took one look at the photos of
giant wet spots
between the stucco and interior walls and surmised
ohmygodwehavetofixthisnow!
If we were to replace the entire exterior of the building then we'd be looking at upward of $700,000. That's roughly an average assessment of $40,000
per unit.
Holy hell, right? But what choice did we—rational adults who want to protect not just our homes but also our years of equity—have?

“Well, obviously the problem isn't going to correct itself,” I said, believing I was stating the obvious. I had visions of my cat, my wardrobe, my DVR stuffed with unwatched
House Hunters
episodes, lying beneath a heap of soggy, mold-laden drywall. “We'll need to fix it. All in favor?” I was in a hurry, I admit. The aforementioned DVR had a ton of trashy television I was dying to rot my brain with. Way more fun than an engineering report.

Apparently my friends and neighbors were of a different mind. “Fix it?” Cheryl from downstairs asked. “Fix it how?”

“With hair dryers and ShamWows,” I said. I see
someone
didn't read the report! “Or, you know, with, you know, professional engineers. Like how they discuss on page forty-three of the report Skip gave—”

“You a crazy one?” Aella—the superloud, bossy, overbearing, gossipy Croatian woman who grows the most fantastic tomatoes every summer—shouted.

“Who are you talking to?” I asked. It's really hard to tell with her because she's constantly rolling her eyes.

“I think to you,” bitchy banker girl whom I never officially met so I have no idea what her name is said. Andrea? Adrian? Airhead? Whatever. “It's crazy to think we've all got scads of cash under our mattresses just looking for something to do. But then again, you and your pashmina probably do.”

“Are you freakin' kidding me?” I asked. “First of all, hello. I'm Shelly. Nice to meet you. Second, this was a gift.” I hold out my beautiful orange pashmina. It is fabulous but hardly a sure sign my ficus plant is really a money tree.

“It's a scam,” Aella continued on her tirade.

“Yes, Aella, it's true. You can get knockoffs on any corner in Manhattan, but I assure you this one is real. My friend brought it back from Paris. She was on her honeymoon and still thought of her friends, which is supernice—”

“Not-a the scarf-a!” Aella shouted. “The report! It's a ploy-a between the engineer-a and the property-a management-a company! They want-a buy-a building!”

“That is wholly ridiculous,” I said. “Why would they want to buy a waterlogged, thirty-something-year-old building in Seattle's twelfthmost-popular neighborhood? You people need to come back to reality. Go toward the light, Aella!”

“Hold on,” Joseph, the quiet guy from upstairs who gets a ton of packages from TimeLife, said. Finally, a voice of reason. “How do we know this report is accurate? I mean, if your doctor said you only had two months to live, you'd probably get a second opinion, right? Why should we trust these guys?”

“Because we paid them $8,000 to tell us so!” I shouted. How was it these people had no recollection of the thirty-seven bids we had to get from engineers all over the Pacific Northwest to just be able to
look
at our building! It took three months to settle on this company—a company we all met and liked. A company that provided twenty-three references who had nothing but glowing things to report. A company who even Google couldn't dig up dirt on!

“It's water damage,” I said, trying to remain calm but I could feel the frustration taking form as a lump in my throat. I would start foaming at the mouth any second. And then I would cry. “It's not completely unreasonable where we live. We're about to head into winter—an extremely
rainy winter! Do you really want to pretend this report never happened?”

“
Yes!
” they shouted together like they had been practicing.

“But that's insane!” I tried to reason. “Aella, wasn't it you who complained about condensation along your window sills?”

“
No-a.
You make crazy talk again.”

“Joseph, your bathroom ceiling caved in two years ago when we had all that snow! You got hit in the forehead with a hunk of plaster! I gave you bandages from my Doggy First Aid kit. Remember? We laughed that you had to go to work with a bandage that read
Licks Make It Better.
”

“Oh, I think that was because I forgot to turn my bathroom fan on,” he said. “I'm sure the roof is fine.”

“And Cheryl, weren't you just saying how great it would be to sell your condo and move to Phoenix to be with your daughter and grandkids?”

“Umm, no, I don't think I'd like Phoenix.”

“Too hot,” the airhead said.

“So brown-a,” Aella agreed.

This was unreal. Not only were they out-of-their-tree crazy, delusional, and ill-advised, but they were liars. I have meeting notes that prove every single one of the things I mentioned above. But did I say that? Not really. Did I calmly go over the list of reasons why now, of all times, was when we needed to be vigilant about protecting our investments? Not quite. Did I try to offer compassion and solidarity given the serious financial stress this would be putting on all of us? Not so much.

I took a different route in my attempts to win friends and influence my neighbors. I stood up, pounded a butter cookie with my fist, and proclaimed the room was “chock full of assholes!” and stormed out.

“You're just like your father,” Judy said when she finally let me finish my story. “Whoever makes the most noise wins.”

“Or smashes the most cookies.”

As much as I'd like to believe her, that would be an insult to my dad. While he may be a yeller, he's also very eloquent. He wins fights with astute comebacks and staunch reasoning. And he's quite scary when he raises his voice.

“But Dad would never have beaten a cookie, run out of a room, and called his neighbors assholes.”

“Oh, God no,” she said. “He would have started with that, made them believe they were assholes, and convinced them that he was their only hope for salvation. They'd be writing him checks for $40,000 with one hand and carrying him and his folding chair above their heads with the other.”

See? Not like my dad at all.

Not long after the homeowners meeting, I met up with my friend Karen for drinks and to discuss my options. Her condo went through a similar situation with their siding and she's on her board. If anyone can give me tips on how to convince a bunch of lunatics on the brink of retirement to fork over their 401(k)s, I'm hoping it's her. But condo talk took a backseat to her love life. Honestly, I was glad. I needed a break from the HOA.

Karen is single and was having trouble meeting a decent guy. She tried online dating, speed dating, and blind dating. Nada. I know how hard it is to meet people, so whenever I come across a quality single guy, I offer him up like a bowl of oatmeal and maple syrup to the tree gods. Surprisingly, the guys don't mind.

I thought one co-worker in particular was a great catch, so I threw him into the sacrificial ring and rattled off just a smattering of some of his best qualities.

“He's really smart and funny and a great cook,” I said. “In fact, he gave me this wonderful vegan cookbook for my birthday lastyear.
Veginomicon
, I think it's called. Have you tried vegan food? Don't be scared of it. It's really delicious. I made these delicious tempeh nori rolls. I should give you the recipe. Speaking of which, did I lend you my copy of
The Glass Castle?
I'm starving, we should order!”

“So …” she started. “About your friend?”

“You should order, too. I'm
really
hungry. No sharing.”

She did that “banging your head on the Formica table” thing people do when they're frustrated. Weird. I wondered why she was frustrated.

“Your vegan friend.”

“Vegan? Who? Oh! The guy I want to fix you up with. He's not vegan. He just gave me a vegan cookbook because he thought I would like it. But he is nice to animals. Has two dogs.”

“Sounds great. I'd like to meet him.”

“He is. And he likes his mom but not
too much
and oh, yeah, he's a great Dungeon Master.”

“Dungeon Master?” she shrieked. “Are you joking with me? You think that's a
selling point?
”

“Well, maybe I wouldn't have ten years ago but I kind of do now.”

“I thought vegan was bad.…”

“He's not vegan!” Now I was pretending to bang my head on the table. “And do you even know what a Dungeon Master is? It might not be what you think it is.”

“I know what it is! It's the leader of the nerd cult you're indoctrinated into!”

You say “nerd cult.” I say, “just another day at work.” Whatever.

“Where would we go on a date?” she continued. “An arcade? Maybe a skating rink? Or, I know, his mom's basement so we could read comic books and eat Cheetos?”

“Hey, 1982 called. It wants its preconceived notions and antiquated stereotypes back.”

She laughed. Scoffed, is more like it. “Ha, ha. I'm sure he's nice enough. Just not what I'm looking for.”

“Do you know how much work goes into Dungeon Mastering?” I asked her. “You've got to be clever, creative, charismatic! The amount of prep time and paperwork is second only to what an escrow agent does on a daily basis. They're incredibly dedicated people.”

“You're nuts,” she said. “I want a guy who spends time with me. Not someone who pores over his monster books trying to devise intricate ways to kill his friends.”

“It's not just about monsters and killing your friends,” I explained, but it was no use. My friend wasn't just backing away from the sacrificial ring—she never even approached the coliseum. It's no easy feat to be a good Dungeon Master, and anyone who doesn't know that isn't worth my friend's time.

I left the coffee shop thinking about Dungeon Masters. They're special people. Where would players be without them? Lots of people DM, or have at least tried their hand at it, but there's plenty more that won't touch it with a ten-foot pole. Dungeon Mastering obviously appeals to a certain type of person: someone who is calm in crisis, can think on his or her feet, is spontaneous and creative, and enjoys a captive audience. Dungeon Masters are articulate, gifted storytellers and expert time managers. They are professionals of plot, geniuses of gab, authorities of anecdotes. Players depend on DMs to lead them through stories; very detailed, meandering, sometimes tangential stories. But stories with a purpose.

And that's when I got an idea. I, too, could be an expert leader like Dungeon Masters. All I have to do is become one of them.

Like I said, I dabbled in Dungeon Mastering but I can count how many times on one hand (and a thumb). Let's see, there was that time when I was writing
Confessions of a Part-Time Sorceress
and if you read it you know how that went. If you didn't, fine, I'll tell you: I was nervous and drank too much and had barely enough knowledge of how to be a
player
let alone a Dungeon Master so I ended up way over my head. I'd done it a few more times since then and each time it got a little bit better. My favorite time was for a group of women who had never played before, but unlike the first time, these women actually wanted to play. I used an existing, prewritten dungeon delve appropriate for their level but tweaked the monsters a bit.
I didn't think they'd be so motivated to fight a band of kobolds as they would various reality television stars, like the Kardashians and Hugh Hefner's bimbo girlfriends. When I told R&D about my brilliant use of improvisation they commended me—for my knowledge of
Star Trek: The Next Generation.

“I'm impressed,” Mike Mearls said. “I had you pegged as a
Bridezillas
kind of girl.”

“I am a
Bridezillas
kind of girl!” I said, getting defensive. I suppose he thinks I have no regard for pedicures and aromatherapy, either.

Turns out there's a species of extraterrestrials in the
Star Trek
universe called the Cardassians. Incidentally, the
Star Trek
Cardassians and the E! Kardashians have much in common: Both are humanoids with reptilian features who travel in predatory packs in search of the dominant position in social gatherings. I'm not making this stuff up!

While I would identify as a player, I'm not ruling out Dungeon Mastering. Especially not now.

What is it about this role that attracts some and repels others like Drakkar Noir and custom rims? (Sorry guys. I hope I didn't just burst your bubble.) I must find out and bring my hard-earned research back to the people in a clever, concise, coherent manner.

“I have a great idea for a chapter,” I told my editor. “I should travel the world interviewing Dungeon Masters and find the one common denominator that draws people to this very important role.”

“Uh-huh,” Nina said, nibbling on her cheesy fiesta potatoes. “I'll have to check but I don't think we have the budget for world travel.”

“Well, it worked for Julia Roberts,” I said. “And look how popular
Eat Pray Love
was.”

“Elizabeth Gilbert was the author. Julia played her in the movie.”

“Whatever. Who do you think would play me in the movie about my quest to discover what drives Dungeon Masters? Wait. I could. I was a theater major, after all.”