"THE POWER OF TELEVISION"

I was the property manager of the Harborside Arms Condominium Association in Dennis Port on Cape Cod for eighteen years. Over that time span I came in contact with all sorts of owners and tenants. One lady, let's call her "Emily" (not her real name) was a confused and "lost soul". One could say that she had some marbles and lost some of them.

"Emily" would call me at my home and each time go through a long recitation of who she was, where she used to live, where her daughter lives, and how she used to be married, etc. Maybe she didn't remember that she told me most of her life story each time she called; or maybe she thought I had a very bad memory so she felt she had to tell me everything about her so I would remember who she was.

One winter evening she was found by the local police walking through the nearby downtown Dennis Port in freezing weather wearing just her nightgown. The police brought her back to her rental unit at the condo.

"Emily's" most memorable stunt had to do with the "power of television". She was watching television one afternoon in her second floor condominium apartment and there was a show dealing with a law enforcement team that went to a suspects house. The suspect in the show was busily ripping up and destroying incriminating evidence and lighting some of these documents on fire in the fireplace. For some reason "Emily" decided that it would be a good idea to destroy some of her papers. Lacking a fireplace, she proceeded to take some of her magazines and set them on fire in her bathroom tub in case someone came to her apartment looking for her.

The apartment unit became engulfed in smoke. The police and fire department came to put out the fire. "Emily" was taken to the Cape Cod Hospital for evaluation and never returned to her apartment. A sad but true situation caused by an unstable person and the "power of television".