VISIT

Well moving turned out to be more of an ordeal than I thought. Thursday I spent the morning in Starbucks using their free wifi and drinking tea and in the afternoon I went back to the apartment to have lunch and back stuff up to take to my new place. Rachel’s dad arrived in the afternoon to start packing her stuff and I found out from him that she was moving out that night, not on Friday as she had previously thought. Which meant that I needed to move out by that night too. So I sent a quick text to my friend Stephanie asking if I could crash with her that night. She very kindly said yes.

So I packed up a load of dishes and stuff in my enormous and well-travelled suitcase (it’s been all over the US, to the UK, and to Spain!), grabbed my wooden chair that goes with my desk (I decided I had to give up the desk and rocking chair because they wouldn’t fit in my new place, but I wanted to keep the chair), and headed down to the subway. Only to find that my stuff wouldn’t fit through the turnstile. So I climbed back up to street level and headed down to the other subway entrance that had a handicapped gate. Got on the train, transferred at the appropriate points, avoided killing anyone by goring them with my chair, and eventually made it through the rain to the new apartment. Dropped off the chair, unpacked the suitcase and carried it with me back onto the train. Transferred again and got back to Astoria. It was late, the trip had taken about 2 hours.

There was a moving van in front of the apartment—it was the new people already moving in. Rachel and her dad were still there moving out, so I hopped up the stairs into my room and threw my remaining things into the suitcase as fast as I could. It was heavy and bulky, but I dragged it and my backpack and my shoulder bag down the stairs, said goodbye to Rachel, and walked away. Back to the subway. Back through the handicapped gate. Onto the train. Transfer. And ride to Columbia to where Stephanie lives. I called her when I arrived around 1030pm and she met me at the door of her dorm and helped me upstairs. Her suite is very nice and she was hospitable enough to give me the floor of her tiny bedroom. We sat up talking and catching up until past 1am, then both fell asleep.

The next morning I went through the rain to the closest Starbucks and caught up on emails while I ate an asiago bagel and drank a coffee. Around noon I went back to Stephanie’s, grabbed my stuff, and climbed on the subway to head north to officially move in to my new apartment. Caitlin, the girl I’m replacing, hadn’t quite moved out yet, so we sat and chatted for a bit waiting for her friend to come pick her and her stuff up. Then she was gone and I spent a couple hours rearranging furniture, cleaning, unpacking, washing bedding, running to the grocery, and generally getting moved in.

My new room is lovely: quite large with plenty of necessary furniture. It was a bit dirty, so I deep cleaned all the surfaces and swept everywhere. I moved some things around to maximize space and made plans for where all my soon-to-arrive stuff would go. By the evening I was exhausted from 2 days of dragging stuff around, so I collapsed on the couch and watched episodes from the Glee dvds that I borrowed from Stephanie. I was mildly depressed and lonely, but figured it was from the weather and my exhaustion. I fell asleep around 1am, excited to be sleeping in a real bed for the first time in months.

Saturday I slept in and woke up in time to get a call from Daddy saying he was on his way and would arrive in the early afternoon! Very excited by this news and feeling much better, I spent the morning cleaning the apartment. I’ve discovered that I don’t mind my space being mildly dirty as long as it’s MY dirt, but that when it’s other people’s dirt I find it disgusting and it drives me crazy. So I cleaned the bathroom before I took a shower, and swiffered all the floors. I feel much better now that I know surfaces are clean.

After cleaning, I took a brief walk around my neighborhood, picking up a couple things I needed from the dollar store. I wandered around, getting the geography of the streets in my head. My area is nice: it’s definitely a working class area, not as hip or wealthy as Astoria, but that’s perfectly fine. It makes the rent cheap, and that’s what I need right now. As I walked back to my building I was thrilled to see a familiar silver car pulling up in front: Daddy had arrived!!!

I showed him my room and then spent about half an hour unloading the car (I’m so lucky to live on the first floor—it would have been miserable to try to drag everything up stairs). Afterwards we found a parking spot for the car and hopped on the subway to go downtown. It was so good to see Daddy again and to get to talk and just be with him. We had a lovely afternoon: I showed him the theatres where my shows are, although we weren’t able to go inside any of them, we went to lunch at a fantastic restaurant in Little Italy, splitting spaghetti Bolognese and a veal parmigiana with wine, salad, and an espresso for me. The food was amazing and so was the company—it was hands down the best meal I’ve had since coming to the city. After we ate we wandered around Little Italy and Chinatown, bought pistachio gelato and hot almonds from street vendors, and walked up to the Lower East Side to see my other theatre. Eventually it was time to head back north: we were both tired from all the walking and a little overwhelmed from all the crowds. We came back to my room so Daddy could take a couple pictures, then I walked him back to the car and he drove me back to my building, we said goodbye, and he started his drive home.

It was so wonderful to get to spend time with Daddy; I’ve missed him and the rest of the fam a lot, more so now that I’m in a new place that I don’t yet know well. We spent a lovely day together that I am very grateful for.

After he left I spent about 2 hours unpacking the loads of stuff that he brought up here for me. Eventually I got it all to fit and look presentable. I now have a bookshelf of design supplies and similar, a space on my dresser devoted to drinks (currently tea, coffee, and water, but soon to be joined by wine and whiskey), and a bookshelf of tons of books and binders. And my walls are all decorated with postcards, quotes, and photographs. I even have candles that I lit last night. The place is starting to feel more home-y; I think I will be very happy here. I had trouble getting to sleep after I unpacked, so I watched some more Glee and read part of a book. Eventually fell asleep around 130.

Today I slept in again, and have been puttering about taking it easy all afternoon. I’m heading to church soon and will be back up and running again tomorrow, I hope. I fighting not to get depressed and to keep busy and positive and thinking. I’m working to structure my days so that I stay productive. I hope to work in an exercise regimen and daily design challenges to keep myself thinking.

This coming week I’ll have more work on my show, will be looking for a framing job, and will be assisting Jon again with more model building—he emailed me last night as I was packing to say that he needed me again. I’m excited; it should be good. And I am going to start cooking again, now that I have my recipes again. I have been eating breakfast burritos almost exclusively for the last while, but I plan to expand and make poppyseed chicken this week. Hopefully soon to be joined by pumpkin bread, or maybe banana bread. And I will buy cider in the next few weeks. Because it’s FALL and I’m very excited for it!