#1 problem with my at-home lack of internet access? Being unable to chip a couple dozen more points of my JunkBot score so i can rank in the international top100 (right now i’m 175 145 133 125 109)! Aside from the obvious connection to my intense need to dominate simple contests where i have an unfair advantage of time, age, or resources, my non-stop marathon of junking actually gave my spacial geometry skills a much-needed boost just in time for my moving process. So, any effective interior design i’ve done this week directly results from Lego.Com. And, that you just have to love.
Somewhere in my head i added up the price of my virtually shiny electronic airline ticket and the last month’s rent on my old apartment and the deposit on my new apartment and came up with an answer that equaled a whirlwind Labor Day shopping spree on South Street, and my wallet is still huddled down at the farthest corner of my pocket shivering and scared that i might try to pry yet another crisp $20 from it’s smooth leather grasp.
The entire list of purchases included (in meticulous receipt-confirmed order): Beth Orton’s Central Reservation, two hanging chandelier lamps from and one string of 15 chinese-latern style indoor lights, eight new lightbulbs, the new Ancient Melodies of the Future from Built to Spill, three pretty flowers for our living room, three heavy cardstock posters (Yellow Submarine, one for a Hair-style 60’s Be-In, and a funny spoof on drug culture), the sexiest pair of UnionBay cordouroy pants ever to touch my ass, poster-hanging gum, Fleetwood Mac’s Greatest Hits, Alicia Key’s Songs in A Minor, & Joni Mitchell’s Court and Spark. Yes, my characteristic $50+ on compact disc purchases is present in full force, but otherwise i actually managed to make some house-relevant purchases (a cam shot of me half-naked wearing the new pants sitting under my lantern lights will be forthcoming whenever i get my internet connection up)(and do situps for three months).
All i have left to buy is a dishrack, and then i think i’ll let my wallet go into hiding (oh, except for the umpteen new cds coming out this month and my impending trips out of the city. And, coincidence of all coincidences, my full-time job ends one day before my birthday. Damn me and my addictions to pop culture and sale-priced merchandise).
Last night i didn’t get back to the apartment until nearly ten, having gone for well over half a day without much of a moment’s rest at all. I wearily made it up the two flights of stairs to our parlor, took a few minutes to exchange pleasantries with the roommates, mounted the third (steepest) set of stairs to my bedroom and then rolled into my bed. I was nearly out like a light while from downstairs i was being asking if i wanted to walk down the block and get some sushi, and i have no recollection of anyone returning with a meal in hand.
It occurs to me as my first week living with Linsday and Erika (and, for the moment, Jack) wears on that sharing a house with me must be a terribly surprising. Before Jack and Linsday moved into Erika’s old apartment (the Player’s House) they had been there so often that they were roommates by extension long before they were ever roommates by virtue of having a key. They were known quantities. While they surely had funny quirks about the kitchen or the bathroom or keeping tidy, the experience of sharing space with them was not a revelation of any kind.
On the other hand, there is me… alternately extroverted and introverted at parties, sporadically but dedicatedly a participant in theatre, and a music enthusiast who refuses to concede his theoretical superiority of intelligence. With every tiny interaction i have with Erika in the kitchen or while knocking on Linsday’s bedroom door i realize that anything i could be doing would be a surprise to them, because i don’t know what they might be willing to expect based on what they’ve known of me so far. Tiny things like my willingness to attack the dishes if asked, or the controlled cyclone of my room, or my quick retreat to the seclusion of loud music and a game of Snood before bed… all of them seem strange enough to me but i can’t imagine trying to fit them into the strangely perceived context of me that they must already have.
The other side of this thought process is that any given set of roommates alters one’s behaviour in a different kind of way. Kenny kept me cheery and social, Victor left me territorial and bitchy, Matt trained me to apathetic and sedentary. Each of these influences weren’t exactly surprises, since my roommates were unflappable, disrespectful, and disinterested in that order. So, i’m wondering how my new housemates are seeing me (especially Linsday, who i’ve been around the most both in and out of the apartment) and how i’ll subtly change as the year goes on.
Isn’t it funny how i’m sitting here waiting to find out who i am? Maybe it just seems amusing from the inside…
Time passes quickly on the internet and after spending a few days away i feel as though i’m hopelessly out of the loop. Everyone is back at school and merrily battling against their first week of classes sending us photoless postcards of their experiences for us to savor and scrape for every last detail until the next one is posted. For a moment somewhere in there i had that same sensation of momentum… out of my old apartment, into my new one, settling into my new space, heading out to shop for new decoration… but in the end i seem to have wound up right back where i left off on Friday, which is the same place i’ve been leaving off for months now. Of course, a physical change is really only three weeks away with the start of my third year of classes, but this Drexel-induced time warp doesn’t represent the entire story; even when classes start it won’t be as if i’ve started any huge new adventure – rather just another leg of the same tired journey i’ve been on all along.
Hopefully this year i’ll manage to fit in more detours. In the meantime you can watch my tires spin and spin as i get exactly nowhere, i suppose..
This morning i woke up before nine and just laid flat cradled between my bed and the slope of the ceiling, watching sunlight and shadows do ballet on my brick wall. My thoughts were racing but my body was in no mood at all. The last two days were long and my body is sortof protesting every move and bend, and no amount of food seems like enough after just eating a piece of pizza and a pretzel and two handfuls of motrin since thursday. Collecting the last remnants of my stuff from the Matt apartment was not a joy, but afterwards i brought my mattress here so i got one of my first comfortable night’s sleep at home in a long time.
My life is at once cluttered and spacious, and so is the fourth floor of this house… a study in controlled clutter starting at the foot of my bed and spread across the entirety of the converted attic. This morning Linsday and I went with Jack to watch his sister play soccer against Drexel, and we were only really a mile up the street from where they used to live but it felt totally different. I feel like i’ve stepped outside of my life and the neighborhood has changed.
Plus, i have my own bedroom and bathroom now :)
This is sortof cheating my no-net weekend, because the old phone line is still up and everyone needed to check their email. So, i’m leaving you a cam picture, and then back off into obscurity i go.