A time to gain, a time to lose
It's been a while.
In any event, I've recently passed the year-since-I-moved-to-Philadelphia mark, and it feels very cyclical. The weather's the same, the smell is the same as when I first moved here.
I'm at the same jobs, I live in the same apartment.
I'm seeing the City Year kids, all fresh-faced and hopeful in their red City Year jackets, all over the place, just like last year when I'd just moved here. Alli and I used to meet and eat our sandwiches on our lunch breaks in Rittenhouse Square every once in a while, and the City Year people would be doing jumping jacks and vaguely tai chi moves under the instruction of a muscley man with glasses and flowing blond hair who looked like he'd be more at home in Camelot.
I helped one extremely grateful City Year girl fill her bike tires at the gas station across the street from my work yesterday.
I've been at Springboard for one year and four days, the same length of time as the air hockey table in the basement. The air hockey table stopped being novel after a couple of months, especially after the service department got a Wii, and now it's used mostly as a regular table to put computer parts and stacks of papers.
I haven't felt like writing so much lately because I've been pretty down about my situation not having significantly changed over the last year. I'm still working a bitch job where I say "debit or credit?" thirty times a day. I've failed to get a "real" salaried job in a field I'm interested in. I've failed to get a job that uses/justifies my Oberlin education/student loans. I haven't written any new fiction. I haven't worked on my comics. I've failed to really get going on freelancing in any significant way. And I tell you what, I've been pretty fucking down about all of that for the past month or so.
It didn't help that the apartment (through catsitting) somehow got fleas, which remained and drove us to the brink of insanity weeks after the cat had gone back to her owners. Because life frustration + very little sleep + little fucking unkillable demon bugs everywhere + housemates pissed about unkillable demon bugs = utter misery. But we finally got rid of them, through a very expensive exterminator.
This weekend I was the glorious combination of sick, hopeless, cranky because Rajiv's in California visiting his family and premenstrual, so I decided to spare everyone the emotions/mucus and stayed in. I spent the whole time painting, cleaning and repairing things, which I generally find soothing when I'm frustrated about something.
My apartment now looks pretty decent. I painted the long, narrow hallway that leads to the living room bright blue, and cut stencils and spraypainted silver and black fish on it so it looks like you're walking through an aquarium. I also painted the bathroom this odd shade of yellow which some insist is green. It is YELLOW.
I resigned my lease last night with Andreas and Nick. My landlady Ella (a sweet Polish grandmother who dyes her hair an unnatural shade of red) and her husband came over and we signed in the living room, and they liked the home improvements I've been working on. They really liked the fish.
So we're sitting in my living room, going over the lease. It's the same exact lease as Lekha and Carol and I signed a year ago, so I'm not paying that much attention. We get to the bit about our cosigners, which I hadn't thought about. Ella says she'll make copies for us to send to our parents, and I say, Hey, I've been paying my own rent this whole year, should I still have my parents cosign? Do you want to run a credit check on me?
Ella tilted her head and looked at me for a couple seconds, then said no, I'd been very reliable all year, I didn't need to have my parents cosign.
And the malaise (as Rajiv's been calling it) broke like a fever.
I've been paying my own rent, cleaning my own house, cooking my own food, doing my own dishes for a whole year. I'm not late for things anymore. I don't forget as much. I've been such a flake for my entire life, and now I pay all my bills on time and make deadlines. I paid off my credit card that's been dogging me since that one awful/awesome summer of 2005. I got a boyfriend who I like a lot. I know basic bike repair. I've made a lot of new friends, and my old ones are present and excellent. I've started practicing piano again. And I have a really sweet mural.
I spent my four years at Oberlin learning how to write, how to play music, how to operate under extreme stress, how to think and read and speak. I've spent this last year learning how to function as an adult and slowly coming to the sad but necessary realization that sometimes, even if you try your ass off, things aren't going to turn out the way you hoped. I feel OK about writing that off as a year well-spent.
I'm feeling better. Now it's time to get back on the horse.
In any event, I've recently passed the year-since-I-moved-to-Philadelphia mark, and it feels very cyclical. The weather's the same, the smell is the same as when I first moved here.
I'm at the same jobs, I live in the same apartment.
I'm seeing the City Year kids, all fresh-faced and hopeful in their red City Year jackets, all over the place, just like last year when I'd just moved here. Alli and I used to meet and eat our sandwiches on our lunch breaks in Rittenhouse Square every once in a while, and the City Year people would be doing jumping jacks and vaguely tai chi moves under the instruction of a muscley man with glasses and flowing blond hair who looked like he'd be more at home in Camelot.
I helped one extremely grateful City Year girl fill her bike tires at the gas station across the street from my work yesterday.
I've been at Springboard for one year and four days, the same length of time as the air hockey table in the basement. The air hockey table stopped being novel after a couple of months, especially after the service department got a Wii, and now it's used mostly as a regular table to put computer parts and stacks of papers.
I haven't felt like writing so much lately because I've been pretty down about my situation not having significantly changed over the last year. I'm still working a bitch job where I say "debit or credit?" thirty times a day. I've failed to get a "real" salaried job in a field I'm interested in. I've failed to get a job that uses/justifies my Oberlin education/student loans. I haven't written any new fiction. I haven't worked on my comics. I've failed to really get going on freelancing in any significant way. And I tell you what, I've been pretty fucking down about all of that for the past month or so.
It didn't help that the apartment (through catsitting) somehow got fleas, which remained and drove us to the brink of insanity weeks after the cat had gone back to her owners. Because life frustration + very little sleep + little fucking unkillable demon bugs everywhere + housemates pissed about unkillable demon bugs = utter misery. But we finally got rid of them, through a very expensive exterminator.
This weekend I was the glorious combination of sick, hopeless, cranky because Rajiv's in California visiting his family and premenstrual, so I decided to spare everyone the emotions/mucus and stayed in. I spent the whole time painting, cleaning and repairing things, which I generally find soothing when I'm frustrated about something.
My apartment now looks pretty decent. I painted the long, narrow hallway that leads to the living room bright blue, and cut stencils and spraypainted silver and black fish on it so it looks like you're walking through an aquarium. I also painted the bathroom this odd shade of yellow which some insist is green. It is YELLOW.
I resigned my lease last night with Andreas and Nick. My landlady Ella (a sweet Polish grandmother who dyes her hair an unnatural shade of red) and her husband came over and we signed in the living room, and they liked the home improvements I've been working on. They really liked the fish.
So we're sitting in my living room, going over the lease. It's the same exact lease as Lekha and Carol and I signed a year ago, so I'm not paying that much attention. We get to the bit about our cosigners, which I hadn't thought about. Ella says she'll make copies for us to send to our parents, and I say, Hey, I've been paying my own rent this whole year, should I still have my parents cosign? Do you want to run a credit check on me?
Ella tilted her head and looked at me for a couple seconds, then said no, I'd been very reliable all year, I didn't need to have my parents cosign.
And the malaise (as Rajiv's been calling it) broke like a fever.
I've been paying my own rent, cleaning my own house, cooking my own food, doing my own dishes for a whole year. I'm not late for things anymore. I don't forget as much. I've been such a flake for my entire life, and now I pay all my bills on time and make deadlines. I paid off my credit card that's been dogging me since that one awful/awesome summer of 2005. I got a boyfriend who I like a lot. I know basic bike repair. I've made a lot of new friends, and my old ones are present and excellent. I've started practicing piano again. And I have a really sweet mural.
I spent my four years at Oberlin learning how to write, how to play music, how to operate under extreme stress, how to think and read and speak. I've spent this last year learning how to function as an adult and slowly coming to the sad but necessary realization that sometimes, even if you try your ass off, things aren't going to turn out the way you hoped. I feel OK about writing that off as a year well-spent.
I'm feeling better. Now it's time to get back on the horse.