by ihatebenaffleck23
“Are you gonna protect the family, Michael?” is what I expected my landlord to ask me the first time I met her. When I tell you that she looks exactly like the real-life version of Sandra Bullock’s character in the 2009 hit film, The Blind Side, exactly would be an understatement– because it is her. Upon arrival, she pulled up in her green, striped Mini Coop and stepped out in jeans whiter and tighter than Ellen DeGeneres. With blonde, Farrah Faucet hair, cork wedges, and a bright pink shirt sporting sleeves with a “decadent” puff, my landlord could be no one other than THE Leigh Anne Tuohy. Granted, she doesn’t own 89 Taco Bells, nor does she have that famous southern drawl, but she does own $6 million dollars’ worth of property around Burlington and I can hear that Old North End twang in her voice.
Upon leasing, I expected I’d be living out my Blind Side dreams. I think we can all agree that it’s only reasonable to assume that living in one of Leigh Anne Touhy’s homes comes with some amenities. For example, she was supposed to take me clothes shopping at a Big and Tall™, but she didn’t. I presumed she would buy me a bed, but she didn’t. And I swear, if she doesn’t invite me to be on their Christmas card this holiday season, I will not go play football for Ole Miss. The only explanation I can think of for this kind of unreasonable treatment is that I’m a Democrat, and there’s nothing the Touhys and landlords hate more than Democrats.
I am in a bit of a predicament if she doesn’t like me because much like Leigh Anne, my landlord is the embodiment of gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss. Just last week she tried to lease my apartment while I’m still living in it. Unlike Leigh Anne, however, her choice of prey is not homeless Black boys but instead young adults without housing. Her tenets’ race doesn’t matter because the only color my landlord sees is the green flooding into her bank account each month.
The cameras I placed in her house earlier this year have yet to catch a Black football prodigy sleeping on her couch, but when they do, I hope she’s movie ready.
Categories: around town, sept. 28, vol 25