If You Don't Have Big Breasts, Put Ribbons on Your Pigtails (4 page)

Then Mom's face lit up with the birth of an idea. "After dinner," she announced, "we're all making lemonade. Let's finish up, Ellen and Eddie clear the table, and everyone report to the living room."

We gulped our dinner down and quickly finished our after-dinner duties, eager to see how Mom would make lemonade in the living room. "Sometimes," Mom instructed as she strategically sat each of her children on and in front of the two sofas, hiding the duct-taped rips, "things are better than they seem. All you have to do is see them that way! So, see us as RICH —and don't move! Don't move a muscle." Our arms and our legs were crisscrossed over one another in a homespun game of Twister. The laughter became contagious. Mom had turned our ripped sofa into a giggling work of art.

When Denise welcomed her boyfriend Bruce into our living room, he didn't notice the rips on the sofas because they didn't matter. What he saw instead was a family that he instantly liked. A family rich with the excitement of being a family.

Mom was rights I thought, looking at the reflection of my furry coat in the polished mahogany of Mr. Campagna's desk. It's all in how you look at things.

"Mr. Campagna!" I stated clearly. "I'm not a prostitute, I'm a real estate broker] "

Mr. Campagna put down his pen and hinted at a smile. "Well, then, Miss Corcoran," he said, "why don't you just tell me how you're finding the real estate market?" I thought he might be testing

me, so I told him about the success I was having at Mr. Giffuni's building just three blocks away from his building. It was, of course, the only success I knew. When I told him I had gotten Mr. Giffuni $340 for his third-floor one-bedroom (not mentioning my wall idea), he seemed even more shocked than if I had been a prostitute.

I asked Mr. Campagna who rented his apartments, and he made it quite clear that "Mr. Herbert Cramer has always been the exclusive agent for all the Campagna Properties." After he explained to me what an exclusive was and that it had a "guaranteed commission upon closing,*' I decided I had better try to get a few of those.

"Mr. Campagna," I asked, "if Mr. Cramer rents all your properties, why are there so many apartments vacant in your building?" He didn't seem to have an answer, so I suggested he give me just one of those apartments to rent. Then, not wanting to appear too pushy, I added, "The one Mr. Cramer likes the least."

Apartment 3C was next door to the superintendent's apartment and had been vacant for a long time. It had a narrow galley kitchen, and a long, straight living room, with no hopes of ever having a den. Apartment 3C faced the back and never saw the light of day. The building at Eighty-sixth Street and First Avenue was in the wrong location. It was just one block too east and just one block too west, and the Gristede's grocery store directly across the street had tons of garbage stacked outside.

I arranged to meet my customers two blocks away on tony East End Avenue so I could begin each showing by admiring the wonderful prewar buildings that lined that avenue. "We're walking toward Fifth Avenue," I'd sav as we crossed First Avenue on East Eighty-sixth Street. I'd gesture toward the Gristede's grocery store "so conveniently located right across the street," and then whirl us through the revoking doors into Mr. ORourkes "meticulously kept lobby." There I'd find Mr. (TRourke (my new best salesman) proudly standing next to the mailboxes, and I'd introduce him to our prospective tenants.

He'd turn on his Irish charm and proudly tour them through his spotless service areas and stairwells. Fd thank Mr. O'Rourke and ride my customers up in the elevator, remarking that "the owner is so proud of this building that he moved his own family in."

Once my customers saw all the good things Mr. Campagna's building had to offer, they were writing their checks before I even turned the key of Apartment 3C, Apartment 7F, Apartment 21 A. . . .

That's how it came to be that Mr. Herbert Cramer no longer held the exclusive on Mr. Campagna's building.

MOM'S LESSON #3: If the sofa is ripped, cover it with laughter.

THE LESSON LEARNED

ABOUT FINDING THE GOOD

IN SOMETHING BAD

When Denise whined about the torn sofa, my mother was savvy enough to see the liability as an opportunity and used it to teach us how truly rich we were.

If I hadn't almost been evicted as a prostitute, I wouldn't have had the opportunity to meet my landlord, ask for his listings, and leave with a new apartment to rent. The eviction notice and its happy ending taught me that opportunity hides in the worst situations, when the timing's not right, and when everyone else agrees that the only prudent move is to lie low. Finding opportunity is a matter of believing it's there.

unbiased eye, so today we'll not discuss prices." I said a quick prayer that the New York Times classifieds would at least give me a handle on what apartments were selling for. "Once youVe seen what's out there, we'll find a quiet place to sit, and you can ask whatever questions you might still have. If we're lucky, we'll have time to squeeze in a bite to eat." I'd walk him to the Yorkville Diner and order the made-from-scratch souvlaki special, I figured, which should swallow another hour to an hour and a half. If my math was correct, I would drop him back at the Drake around four, too late in the day for him to take off with another broker.

"Tomorrow," I continued, "we'll start out bright and early and look at every apartment for sale in the neighborhoods you've selected. I'm sure you'll find that after today's tour, you will see them with a very different, more knowledgeable eye."

I had him in a New York minute. He nodded in dumbfounded agreement.

My buyer never doubted that I knew what I was talking about because although I didn't know the sales market, I knew how to fill in the blanks. It was a talent Mom taught me to recognize one night after dinner in second grade, the day Sister Stella Marie told me I was stupid.

Second grade. Edgewater.

The night Sister Stella Marie ruined my day, I was painfully quiet, while Mom rounded the table asking her usual "And how was your day?" question. Jump Johnny Jump announced that there was a new "cool" kid in the neighborhood and Tippy Toe Tommy reported that he had found a pair of high heels in the Mertzes' trash. When Mom got around to me, my eyes dropped to the turquoise tablecloth. "It was f-f-fine," I swallowed, not willing to tell my day's far-from-fine adventure. That day after school, following the instructions of Sister Ann Teresa, I had walked down the hall to my old first-grade classroom at

the Holy Rosary School, the classroom ruled by mean Sister Stella Marie. Not sure why I should be going back to the first-grade classroom, I hesitantly pushed against the red metal door. It opened into a scene from a childhood horror film. The only other children in the room were Ellen Mulvaney (not her real name), known as "the retarded girl," and Rudy Valentino (really his name, but no relation to the Rudolph Valentino of silent screen fame. Rudy lived in West New York, New Jersey, and spoke not a word of English). I looked at Ellen, then at Rudy, and my happy world screeched to a halt louder than fingernails on a blackboard. Oh no, I thought, I've been found out!

Sister Stella Marie pointed with her ruler to the desk between Ellen and Rudy. It was the same green ruler she had used to whack my neck in first grade when I couldn't figure out the answer to an arithmetic problem at the blackboard. I put my books on the metal rack under the seat and sat down. She pulled at her starched white collar, buried her hands into her draping black sleeves, and glowered: "You children can't read. And Fm going to teach you how."

While Sister read from the first-grade Dick and Jane reader, my mind immediately wandered down the hall and out of the building. Mr. Colontoni, our milkman (we called him "Fat Ray Joe Potty Macaroni Colontoni"), had given me an empty milk bottle that morning, and I had the bottle and a ball of yarn in the basket of my blue bike. I was going to the Hudson River to catch a big fish. (Well, okay, a silver guppy. But magnified in the bottle, it would look like a big fish.) I was going to put it in a glass bowl, hide it under Ellen's bed, and keep it as a pet.

"Well, Barbara Ann?" Sister Stella Marie interrupted my daydream. "Can you read the next page, please?'

Not wanting to admit I didn't know what page she was on, I told her, "No." Sister leaned over, close enough for me to see the black hairs twitching on her chin. "Barbara Ann. if you don't pay attention," she scowled, "you'll always be stupid."

I sucked in my breath, counted to a hundred, and concentrated hard so the tears burning my eyes wouldn't leak out. After class, I

cried my way back to our house on Undercliff Avenue, ran up to the woods, and sat on my big rock by the stream. I just knew I would never learn to read. Every time I guessed, I was wrong. And when I knew I was right, I was wrong. It wasn't that I wanted to daydream; it just always happened. I couldn't understand the words unless they were read to me: b always looked like d, p looked like g, and e just looked weird. When I tried to read, my brain was like our Christmas-tree lights that went out when one of the bulbs went bad.

I stifled my tears in time for dinner, not wanting anyone to know that Sister Stella Marie thought I was stupid. How could I be? I was the family entertainer, I created the games, and I was the director of all our basement Broadway shows! I had to be brilliant! I couldn't be stupid. Could I?

After the table was cleared, my mom asked me to stay with her in the kitchen. "I got a call today from Sister Stella Marie, Barbara Ann," she told me while sweeping the floor. "She said you're having trouble reading." I said nothing, but my eyes welled with tears. Mom put down the broom, held my shoulders with both hands, and looked lovingly into my eyes. "Barbara Ann," she said encouragingly, "don't you worry about it. You have a wonderful imagination. And with it, you can fill in any blanks. "

She smiled and picked up her broom.

I knew I had to use my imagination to fill in the blanks with my customer the next day. Combing through the Times that evening in the new apartment I shared with Ray, I realized that the New York market was changing. I had been so busy hustling rentals over the last two years, I hadn't noticed that the "For Sale" section of the paper had grown larger than the "Rental" section. Over half the classifieds formerly "For Rent" were now being offered "For Sale."

The whole town seemed to be going co-op. The city's longstanding rent control laws had slowly strangled landlords' profits, pushing them to find a new way to make money. The answer was an

"only in New York" harebrained scheme of selling apartments on a cooperative basis. This meant that the buyers of co-ops didn't own their apartments outright, as with condominiums. Instead, they owned shares in the building. Condos were the norm everywhere else in the world; New York just had to be different.

I picked up my phone and called the first two-bedroom apartment that was advertised by its owner—a RIV VU, 2 BR on Sutton Place—and began what would become my standard sales pitch:

"Hello, this is Barbara Corcoran of Corcoran-Simone Real Estate. I'm working with a wonderful young engineer from Union Carbide who has been transferred to New York. He's in town for only one day and needs to buy an apartment tomorrow at the latest. He s asked me for an apartment with ..." Then I read the seller the detailed description from his own ad, and he responded that his apartment sounded "just like that!"

"I know this might be a terrible imposition," I talked on, "but could I possibly show my customer your apartment at either nine-fifteen or nine-thirty tomorrow morning?"

After the seller agreed to the appointment, I bubbled him with thank-you's and ended the conversation with what would soon become my "Oh-and-by-the-way-just-one-more-question" Columbo close: a few last-second queries guaranteed to ferret out just how negotiable the price really was.

"Oh and by the way," I quickly asked the now excited seller, "have you had manv offers on your apartment? Well, has it been on the market very long? Oh, really? Where will you be moving to? Oh, congratulations! When are you expecting to close? Wonderful! I really look forward to seeing you tomorrow at nine-fifteen." If the apartment turned out to be what my customer was actually looking for, I knew I was armed to close.

By the time I finished combing the paper that night and working my sales pitch, I had twelve appointments set. Four were with non-negotiable sellers, six with folks who would take something less than their price, and two with gotta-get-outta-herr-fast sellers.

God was my cobroker when my customer and I walked into the lobby of a twenty-story prewar on East Eighty-fourth Street. Apartment 9K was our eighth apartment of the day, and as we walked past the doorman, my customer beamed, "My boss just bought in this building!" When I found out his boss was living three floors below Apartment 9K, all the rest, as they say, was a piece of cake. The living room was the same cocoa brown as my customer's living room in St. Louis, and the seller's boxes were packed by the door ready to go.

By the time I dropped my customer at the Drake it was four o'clock. His flight was at seven. I circled back to the Hayman and Sumner stationery store, picked up a standard Blumberg sales contract, and rushed back to the tiny office Ray and I had taken in a building on East Sixtieth Street. I pecked out the needed information on my new IBM Selectric and circled back to the Drake. My customer was waiting. We jumped in a cab and headed to LaGuardia Airport.

The cab had reached the airport exit when my customer looked up from the contract and asked the question that bedevils every real estate broker in New York:

"Just what is a co-op anyway?"

"It's what makes New York so special," I began, never having explained these details and having no idea how I would. "You'll be a sharecropper—I mean shareholder. That means the apartment is yours, but you don't really own it." His eyebrow cocked slightly. "Well, you own it, but you don't get a c deed.' Instead, you get a 'lease.' But the great thing about a co-op lease is that there's absolutely no rent, just a monthly maintenance fee, which covers all the salaries of the super and the doormen. And the great thing about that is with a few hundred dollars at Christmas, they'll fix anything.