Internets, there is just so much going on around here, I can barely decide on what to write about. I actually have enough petty grievances saved up to tell you about that I won't need to leave the house for three days. And it's only Wednesday.
I should be sleeping, but the drilling and VERY LOUD pillow fluffing going on in the next room is keeping me up. That's right. Someone is using power tools and fluffing pillows in my former office. My "former" office because a renter is moving into it. A RENTER! Internets, do you know what that means? It means I am *this*much closer to moving out. And you know what else that means? For the next seven days, I get to share my bathroom with a stranger! A bathroom that I pay for! A bathroom that my good credit is helping to secure! A bathroom that I will have to learn to close the door to because when you OWN a bathroom, YOU CAN DO THINGS LIKE LEAVE THE DOOR OPEN WHEN YOU PEE. But you know what that ALSO means? It means I am moving out! In seven days. CLH and I are ending this experiment with co-living and we are moving into our our own place on July 15th: The two year anniversary of our move in date to this house.
After much searching, gnashing of teeth, and tearing of hair, we found a nice little unit in a triplex deep in the heart of one of our favorite neighborhoods back up in the city. It's not the rental house we were hoping for, and it doesn't have hardwoods, and it doesn't have a yard or a garden, but it's going to be ours. All ours. Every night for the past two weeks, I have gone to sleep dreaming about the three things I will want to do immediately upon moving in: walk around in my underwear, drink my morning coffee in front of my computer in peace, and watch obscene amounts of the Discovery Channel while painting my toenails. I'm currently trying to come up with a way to do all three simultaneously.
To be quite honest, though, I'm a little bummed that the apartment only met only 90% of our criteria. I'm excited to actually make the move and get this limbo thing over with, but there's a little nagging voice in my head that thinks that maybe I pulled the trigger a little too soon. I keep telling myself that we're only committing to a year there, that maybe we can go live in Europe or something afterwards. And, after looking at dump after dump, this place was the obvious choice for us, and, um, hello? NINETY percent is a pretty high number. On the advice of friends (thanks, Dave and Sarah!) CLH and I sat down at breakfast one morning during our search and wrote down all the things we wanted in a house. It was a great exercise because a) it gave me an excuse to make a list and lists are like the paper version of Valium to me, and b) it was a great way to expedite the decision making process when we saw a place that we were on the fence about. Some of the things on my list: wanting to hear birds (and NOT airplanes, for the love of god) first thing in the morning, bikeability to most clients' offices, and washer and dryer in the unit. Some of CLH's criteria: place for the missus to write, access to bus lines, and washer and dryer in unit. So, after confirming with each other that we would absolutely, under no circumstances, never, ever, ever travel more than ten feet from our clothes hamper to the washing machine, we took our list to the streets. And the place we chose met most of our demands. We've figured out some work-arounds to the whole non-yard thing (the biggest hangup for me); I'm going to set up a container garden next the garage. And CLH has promised me that he won't cringe too hard when I lay out the bolt of Astroturf on the driveway, roll the grill over it, and call the friends over for a barbecue in our "yard" .
Just to torture myself, I did another craigslist search for houses in our price range tonight. Thankfully, there weren't too many new listings. I say "thankfully" because I think I am still hung up on this not being an ideal new place, and wanted some confirmation that the place we've picked is the best thing out there. Having thought moving in to this house two years ago was a good choice for us, I am feeling like my ability to make a housing decision has become somewhat impaired. I think that I may have done some permanent damage to that lighter, more whimsical person I used to be when I agreed to move in to a fixer upper in the suburbs. Now I'm considering massive flowcharts and bar graphs designed to show, for instance, the inverse relationship between sleeping and planes flying overhead, before making ANY decisions. I know my wish list is a little unrealistic, especially in a rental situation, but, I sort of wanted this next place to be this beautiful, commodious, centrally located dreamhouse of a house. I think I need to realize that what we have chosen is going to be just what we need. Also, it sort of feels like it's SUPPOSED to be ours. I don't want to make too much of it, but I'm pretty sure the universe was trying to dropkick us in the head with this one. At the exact SECOND we finished clearing everything out of my office to make it ready for a renter, the landlady called to give us the place for $50 less than what she was originally asking. Did we need a bigger hint to take the damn place already?
We're just about ready to go, too. CLH and I spent last weekend stacking nearly everything we own into a very sexy 10' by 5' by 7' pile in our garage. We're at the dreaded place now where there are just random things lying around needing to be packed. Stuff that didn't get caught in the dragnet of my organization the first time around... things like the lone fork that's been in and out of the dishwasher a few times, the decorative glass jar that was hiding behind the sequined penguin ornament, a spool of thread, and the battery hatch cover to SOMETHING we own. That kid of stuff. I'm so OVER the whole packing thing, I'm starting to pack very unlike myself. I'm just throwing (inhaling slowly to calm myself) unrelated junk into a box. And the list-making, regularly-scheduled-sock drawer-organizing side of me is breaking out in hives over it. It's a slippery slope, that kind of packing. Classic gateway behavior. Sure, it's just a little toaster in with the tennis rackets now. But, soon enough, we'll be wearing stained sweatpants and "I'm With Stupid" t-shirts, parking our cars on the front lawn, and tying pieces of steak to fireworks. Just you wait.
Comments
YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY! Movin on up! who cares where - just out. A year of something uncertain is better than another week of known hell! Speaking of lists… I’m a big fan. I start all of mine with:1) Wake up.This way, I always have something cross off my list! (well, hopefully… but then again, I wouldn’t know if I didn’t wake up, right? Sounds like a win win to me…)Can’t wait to hear how the move went - and what you finally did with the box of unrelated objects (goodness gracious….I can see the broken down pickup made into your new garden clear as day….) I have more unrelated objects in my car, daily, than you probably had in your whole house hahahaha! So much for a comment - More like commentary! sorry! :)