moving

Yesterday was the big day! Shelley and Steve arrived last night, safe and sound and only somewhat dazed. I spoke to Shelley not too long ago, and their stuff is currently being loaded into their house. My new roomie moved in last night too, and we'll slowly start setting our own habits.

My life this whole summer was about discrete events: moving, CT's visit, the Esses moving in, having a roommate. Now there's just life.

But man, what a life it is.

I went for a drink with one of my pride makeout friends last week, ostensibly to have a conversation I might fully remember. At one point, well into the evening, the Born Ruffian asked me if I liked my life.

Maybe I was a little lightheaded from the drinking, the kissing, but in reply I used a word I often think, but rarely say out loud. I looked at the ceiling, spread my arms as wide as they could go, opened my mouth.

"I feel blessed."

Man, am I so much less stressed out. It's not like my house isn't a mess, because it really really is. And my mom is going to be here in a few minutes, and tomorrow we're going to start painting, and then it really really really will be.

But I've stopped getting a stomachache after every meal and the dizzy spells have stopped, so I figure that's a pretty good sign that I'm feeling much better.

Internet, I feel like I owe you a big long cozy post about how it went and how happy I am, particularly considering the bitching I've been doing lately. But if I sit down for more than 30 seconds my brain falls asleep.

So back to organizing the cupboards. Next up: spices.

That's the second-last thing Shelley said to me before we got off the phone together.

Have other people found buying a house this stressful? Is it because it's my first time? Is it because I'm a wimp? Is it because I am in that thin-veil few days right before I bleed?

Poor Mike at PC Financial. I've banked with the grocery store for about 7 or 8 years now, and they're a great bank. Sure, I can't walk into a branch and talk to someone, but I've never had to. Until last week, when it became apparent that I was going to have to do some fancy footwork to get a bank draft for the down payment to give our lawyer to buy the house. I couldn't just walk into the bank and show them my ID. There were a few options, all of which required at least one day's notice.

We close tomorrow.

I needed the exact number for the draft. Not for closing, not that day. At least yesterday from that day, and my preference would have been last week from that day. We waited and waited, and then finally, today, sicced our real estate agent on the other real estate agent to get on top of their lawyer, who was the person not giving the information to our lawyer, who really did want to tell us how much money we needed to give him to buy our house.

While Mike was doing his damn fine fancy stepping, he was also asking me questions. Can I call you Megan today? Who had we gone with for our mortgage? What was the rate? What was the term? Oh, hmm, I should look into this and that and had I considered this other thing.

I started crying. Not audibly. But it was gonna get audible in short order. I interrupted him.

"I'm really sorry, but I am incredibly stressed out right now, and that's already been decided and there's nothing I can do about it, so."

I didn't have an end to the sentence, but he did shut the fuck up about my options.

I am so fucking sick of options.

I would like to stop having a stomachache and dizzy spells.

I would like someone to hold my hand and tell me what to do.

Around 5:45 Friday afternoon, my phone rang at work. It was Grace and Greg's number. Of course, I picked it up. Fiona, it turns out, had been sad all day. So sad. Super sad. Whiny sad.

When asked what would make her feel better, turns out she said "Go Megan's, see Freya." Could they make that happen?

Of course they could. What else are pets for except the de-sadding of two year olds?

Though I have no real idea if it worked, since they were off to visit their Bobcia shortly after.

++

There were many things yesterday that caused my simmering down: I made arrangements to buy three ceiling fans for $35, one of those very nice kettles for $25, off of kijiji mostly, thus saving me scads of cash; I had a great yoga class, where I was able to get past a couple of mental blocks I'd been having and into full lotus; it was especially great compared to the class on Thursday, during which I spent 20 minutes crying in the bathroom; the big cry in the bathroom on Thursday; certainly not least, the aforementioned Skype date.

The most important thing, though? More important to my general well being and mental health than all of those things put together?

I present to you, the list.*

Like many fellow neurotics/librarian-types, I'm a compulsive list maker. When I clean my desk off at work, clean out my day timer, empty the papers at the bottom of my bag, I find tons of lists. Most of them I'd forgotten I'd made, many of which no longer make any sense.

For this move, I had the lists of people who've volunteered their time, I had lists of what needed to be cleaned, I had lists of what needed to be double checked, what needed to be tripled checked, who needed to be reminded of what, and what I needed to buy to be prepared for the actual move.

All written on scraps of paper clipped on my desk at work, on my kitchen table at home, in my day timer, at the bottom of my bag.

And the tickertape was wearing me down.

Thursday, I stole about 7 feet of brown paper off the roll at work, tacked it up in my long long hallway, found all the lists I could find, and transcribed every thing from them onto the brown paper.

I promised myself that as soon as I thought of something, I would write it on the list. If I thought of it again, my mantra would be "ON THE LIST."

My brain caught on pretty quick. I had to use the mantra maybe 5 times before my brain just relaxed, and my shoulders with it.

++

I can only guess that the Go Megan's visit worked.

It's the best thing on there.

*Some of those names might not be right. The list is not so much for veracity as for the quieting of minds.

Nearly two weeks ago now, during the garage sale, Greg came by for a visit. Jennifer and Michael and I were broiling in the morning sun, sweating. I was also visibly pinkening.

"What you need," Greg said, "is a hat. Yes. A sun hat. Or a pergola. I'm here to tell you what you need and that is a pergola."

I laughed, because it was really funny. But after Greg left, I turned to Jennifer and Michael.

"Do either of you know what a pergola is?"
"Nope," Michael said.
"Me neither," said J. "Should I look it up?"

She did.

Last Wednesday, during the crazy Bikini Expedition, Shelley and I walked over the bridge from the Rideau Centre to the Bay. We saw the perfect thing to shade us at the side of the house. We'd been talking umbrellas and gazebo-like things.

But no. On that bridge, we found exactly what we needed, and what we needed was a pergola.

A Suede Fiji 8'x12' Steel Pergola with Adjustable Top. For 40% off, no less.

Anyone who's spent any time talking to me lately know that I am not my most fun self right now. The details of all the changes going on right now are exhausting me.

There's a constant tickertape of stupidity running in the back of my brain that doesn't let up, so that even when I turn the lights out at 10, I toss and turn for 45 minutes thinking

Don't forget the bars you hang your mugs on. Don't forget to vacuum the ceiling. Don't forget to order the tin. When is the car coming? Will I have enough time to get a bank draft for the down payment? What does CT take in his coffee, I wonder? Cream, I think. I should get some of that before he gets here.

Surely, surely, I don't really need to be worrying about what CT might take in his coffee two and half weeks from now. Particularly since even should I forget to ask, or should I forget to buy whatever milk product it is after I have received his answer, I live less than a block away from 4 places that sell cartons of milk on Sunday mornings.

But there you go, my brain is in worry mode, and marshalling details mode.

Sadly, this is cutting short the disk space available for patience mode. Which is why, when it took me an hour to buy the pergola today, I came back to work nearly frothing.

When I got to the pergola today, not long after noon, there was a sign on it that obscured the price and description. "HOLD FOR JAN, JUL 24th."

Fuck fuck fuck, I thought. This must be the last one. They're holding the display model for Jan. Fuckity fuck. Ah well. What can you do. We'll find something else. But I'll just go ask the Person just in case.

There was no Person.

There was, however, a sign on the counter that said "Please take your purchases to Ladies' Shoes."

Now, maybe you're skimming this post a little, because it's long and I'm whining a lot, so maybe you missed the measurments, and maybe you missed the adjective. They bear repeating: 8' x 12'; steel.

Sit back for a moment and picture me dragging a steel pergola of that size through Ladies' Shoes. Yes, I laughed too.

But my heart sank at the same time I was laughing. Poor Ladies' Shoes Person. Really, I wanted to just take a tray and plastic cup set over to her. I would hand them over, I might have to explain the sign, she would ring them through, I would pay her, I would leave, we would both be richer in our respective ways.

But no, I didn't want to buy anything. Or rather, I only wanted to buy something after someone had de-riddled the mysterious Jan sign and answered my questions about shipping in a satisfactory manner.

Best case scenario, I figured, was that I would go over, make my request, and Ladies' Shoe Person would call the Bridge Person and we could proceed apace.

"Hi there. I have a question about the steel pergola over there."
"The pardon? Where?"
"The pergola. Over there."
"Oh, on the bridge." She looked visibly relieved. "You'll have to talk to the person over there."

"There is no person over there. There's a sign saying to come here."
"Really? A sign? To come here? Ummm, I don't usually work in this department. I'm from Ladies' Wear."

So, to recap. Ladies' Shoe Person, it turns out, is not even a Ladies' Shoe Person. She is really a Ladies' Wear Person filling in for a vacationing Ladies' Shoe Person. She didn't even know she might have to ring in a tray and plastic cup set from The Bridge.

"Okay. Hmm. There's also a sign on the pergola saying it's being held for Jan. Does that mean it's the last one?"
"Oh. Umm, I'm not sure."
"Oh."

Stand off. I kept quiet. I didn't go away.

"I can call someone?" She picked up the phone.
"Thank you."

She was a valiant Stand-in Ladies' Shoe Person. She called about 5 people looking for information on the availability of the steel pergola.

I stood by the counter, eavesdropping and trying to relax the lines of frustration out of my face. Poor Ladies' Wear Person, I thought, she is having a bad day. If I am to be a thorn in her side, I will try to be the nicest thorn possible.

While I was waiting, I tried on a lot of shoes.

Eventually, Tania came with her walky talky and purposeful stride. Good, a Manager Person. She called a bunch of people too, but she knew the right people to call. First up, I believe, was HR.

"Where's the Bridge Person?"
Pause
"He what? During Power Hour? You're kidding. Okaaaay."
Click.

She turned to me. "He took a break! Because it's only the busiest time of day! But it's fine. I'll get you taken care of."

Next up: Downstairs.

"Yeah, the computer says we have 8 of these pergolas in stock."
Pause.
"I don't know, it's a pergyula. Like an umbrella. But bigger. On stilts."
Pause.
"No, not an umbrella. A perGOLa. Wait, lemme just give you the code."
Pause.
"Okay, great. Could you put one on hold for me, for -" Her eyes on me. "Megan. Unh-huh. Yep. Megan."

She hung up.

I spoke first.

"It probably doesn't help that I'm asking about something I didn't even know existed until two weeks ago." My laugh was entirely fake, but they didn't know that. They both relaxed visibly. And Tania gave me $20 off shipping.

So thanks, Greg, I owe you a beer. With lots of froth.

I'm pretty sure the people at Staples think I'm an asshole. I've called them so many times to "just check in" on the status of my computer that I was a little afraid they'd done the techie version of spitting in my soup.

But no, when I called this morning to find out if it had actually gone out yesterday, because maybe I wanted it back so that I didn't have to rely on the so-last-decade telephone to communicate with my far-flung lover, the nice man who answered the phone, who thankfully wasn't the Emily who'd been aurally frustrated with me the day before, went looking for it and all he found was a note:

Megan Butcher
SEND OUT ASAP

It's quite possible that Emily meant me, but one can hardly blame her for that.

It could take 1 week, it could take 1 month. Until my comuter gets to where it's going, nobody knows how long for sure.

Last night, on the telephone, CT groaned when I told him it was a Sony. Apparently, Sony works on the slow side. So it seems likely that by the time I get my beloved lato back, I will have counted down and gone past the things that I am counting.

+ONE+

The move is going well, I would say. Yes, my apartment is a fucking disaster, and yes, I find it unsettling, and yes, I'm far more irritable about things in general than I normally am. But my packing is well on the way to being finished. It will take 9 days for the tin backsplash to make it to my new address, so I've got ORDER TIN written on next Wednesday and circled. I've got 18 paint chips. I've got 2 moving committees organized. We've signed the mortgage, in duplicate. The insurance is nearly in place after getting 3 quotes.

The ducks, they are waddling into a neat row.

+TWO+

10 days after I move, 3 weeks tomorrow, CT will be touching down in Ottawa at 8 pm. Besides the hotza, I'm really excited to be hosting someone who's not from here.

Since he booked the tickets, I've had new eyes for my city. The big things I want to show him because they're beautiful and everyone knows it - looking up the canal from the Corktown Bridge. The things I love because not many people think to look - the view of the Hintonburg church spire from Empress during a red sunset.

I'm envisioning meandering walks through the streets I love, maybe a couple of shows. Dinner at the Manx, drinks at the Aloha, brunch at my favourite neighbourhood spot.

And the hot hotza.

Suddenly 9 days seems very short.

The light blue filing cabinet I found in the garbage on Saturday was better than the broken black filing cabinet I pulled out of the garbage a year ago. In the blazing 4 pm heat, I carried it home, the scratches and crankiness building apace.

The rest of the afternoon I spent culling and transferring my files. Do I need this article on seasoning cast iron? Yes. Do I need these five articles about stretching after running? No. Do I need all these records of how I pledged my allegiance to the Goob as my primary caregiver six months before I gave her the ol’ heave ho? Really really no.

At some point during this process, I heard some scrabbling in the boxes behind me. Anyone who’s had a cat and boxes in the same room knows that cat fur on cardboard makes a very distinctive sound.

I stood up, stretched my spine out, and went to find my cat. Seemed a pretty easy proposition. She’s not a small cat. There are not so many boxes. But I couldn’t find her. I looked in all the boxes I’d seen her in so far: the small one on the far right in the back, on top of the ones behind the Lovely Box Meghan B. brought me. In the banana boxes stacked three high on the left. Nowhere cat.

Again, the noise. She had to be in the banana box on the far left. Though I was sure I'd looked there.

I looked again. Further down. The top box was not to her liking, apparently. My cat, she is a banana box connoisseur.

I should preface this by saying I had no real reason to cry through the last half of my yoga class tonight.

By most measures, this has been a bang up week. It started with a lovely kgrf visit that involved many hugs. Continued with getting started on quite a few of the things I needed to do for the move. Had a great visit and dinner with Shelley on Wednesday. Bought new pants. Bought tickets for J. and I to go see Wolf Parade.* Met that Mae for beer and backgammon and man, am I ever happy with how that worked out; she fucking rocks and her gay gay haircut is also hot hot. Got home to a fabulously dirty email from CT. Have a date with a Mysterious Person to look forward to on Monday.

What in god's name could I be upset about?

It started with my body. While I know that I'm about 10 times more flexible than I was two and a half years ago, and probably in much better overall shape, it still pains me to sit cross-legged for more than 2 minutes, and full forward bends will be forever out of my reach.

This, of course, is not supposed to matter.

Mostly it doesn't. Tonight it did. Trying to do Prasarita Padottanasana pinged every tight muscle in my legs, which is every muscle in my legs, and I caved, let my knees go knocked, hung there. I'd just had it. I was sick of being tight and sore and it's not fair that other people can do it, lookit, their head just on the floor, just like that, and why should I have to choose between running and biking and walking everywhere and having relaxed leg muscles.

Yeah. Blah blah fucking blah. But still there. And strong enough to make my throat all tight and full of tears.

This happens occasionally while I'm practising yoga. I start welling up because my body won't do what I want it to do, what I think it's supposed to do. And every time I get upset enough about that to start welling, it is never about my body. My body is just a convenient and obvious repository.

I gave up on being calm and started going through the list. Was it the few emails Eric and I have exchanged since he came back from Berlin? No. A little twingey maybe, but still no. Was it that the new pants I bought still make me feel a bit sausage-like? Twingey. PMS? Contributing factor, but, as is always the case with me, not the actual factor; PMS just thins the veil between me and my emotional world. Moving organization type stress? No. Moving-

Big fat tears started rolling down my cheeks. I left quietly and bawled in the bathroom for a long time.

I am grieving the loss of my apartment.

That this is rather a ridiculous thing to be sad about compounds the matter. I am moving into the ideal situation. Living with friends? Forever? In my own neighbourhood that I need like a vital organ? Holy fuck. Moving into a house that is well built, lovingly planned, solid, and, including the house I grew up in, hands down the nicest place I'll have ever lived? Holy mother fuck.

But oh. I love this apartment.

I love knowing its quirks so well they no longer register as quirky: that you can only enter the apartment if you turn the knob to the left, that the hot/cold taps are backwards in the tub but not the kitchen, that the 4th plank from the door in the lean-to is rotting, that you have to turn the knobs five times to have a shower. None of the floors are straight: walking down the hall during a drunk is living dangerously.

It's been almost three years since I've moved in here, out of a situation that was no longer emotionally tenable. Its stud-and-gyprock embrace has nursed me through 2 big hearbreaks I thought might leave me cracked open and pulsing raw forever. I've loved and fucked just as big. I learned how to keep fish. Started yoga. Ate my first kale. Had dinner parties and tea and beer with the people who are my chosen family.

I know that its new occupants will love this apartment too, but my heart is breaking a small break to leave a space that has taken such tender care of me when I needed it most and gone along for the ride when I seemed not to need it at all.

May these resilient walls be as good to Stella and BH as they have been to me.

*During the purchase of said tickets I was so excited I couldn't stop talking and gave the clerk a detailed description of why I thought WP weren't coming, and how relieved I was when some kind person told me they were, because I thought I was going to explode with sorrow if they didn't. And then listed the dates and places I have seen that band, and then gushed about how good Osheaga was after the clerk said he didn't like big festivals.

+1+

Our new backyard was on the way home to my house from Timekode. Shelley and I snuck in and sat on the little bench and looked up at the surprising number of stars. We marvelled how private it was, how quiet, and how lucky we were that the trees surrounding us were in other people's yards. Well, maybe that last part was me.

The backyard is something I hadn't thought of appreciating. Dunno why. Just thought it was nice there was one and that there wasn't too much grass.

But sitting back there in the very dark, talking about barbecues and gardening and flowering bushes? It felt like my heart grew three sizes.

+2+

The next day we'd finagled another visit inside. I wanted to measure stuff, to judge how much cleaning I was going to have to do before moving in, how much painting after. Shelley, ditto, her house.

Funny thing - I'm moving from a one bedroom apartment to a two bedroom house, and I think I'm going to have to get rid of a fair amount of stuff. There's no room for a kitchen table, for instance, and my kitchen table is no shrinking violet of a kitchen table, willing to sit unobtrusively in a back corner.

The upshot of all this is that I felt re-energized for the Getting Shit Done Project. Spent some time with my financial spreadsheets this morning, some time with the fish tank this afternoon. Packed away some winter clothes and bedding. Spent some time in the basement, piles and other piles: wha?, garage sale, organize this later.

Moving jitters have started setting in already, even though the move date isn't for another 6 weeks. But my living room looks like hell. It's half boxes, and what's not empty boxes is an empty aquarium, piles of filing; my bedroom doesn't look much better. If you've known me for any length of time, you know that flux is not a state I love, mess is not a condition I love, and I actually loathe disorganization.

Also, my generally very responsive landlord very kindly replaced the water heater. File "not bathing in brown water" under "Things I Appreciate --> That Touch My Skin." It was done, however, in an impressive display of miscommunication between tank people, electricians, landlord and tenants. People had hot water when they shouldn't have, then didn't have hot water when they shouldn't have. There were many strange men in my basement and Jennifer's.

On another front my generally very responsive landlord has most indubitably dropped the ball. I have called him one hundred times about fixing my goddamn fucking toilet.

It's not broken broken, I can still flush it, and so it still is firmly filed under "Things I Appreciate --> Hygeine." But it is definitely one broken. I have to turn the water on to fill the tank before I flush it, and then turn the water back off after the flush is done or else the water just runs all the time making this super annoying noise, and making me have to pee all the time.

Okay, yes, I am perfectly capable of doing a lefty-loosey righty-tighty. If I had to, if that were some kind of inherent design with which we'd lived for so long we thought it was the right way to do things, okay. Fine.

But it's not. It's a problem that is not actually a problem because it was solved, lo these many moons ago, by industrial designers, those clever people who made toilets in such a way so as to render them usable without turning them on.

I'll be damned if what gives me carpel fucking tunnel is turning my toilet on.

I shouldn't even have to write that sentence.

You know, I had no idea that when I sat down to write, I was going to rant about my toilet. The joys of blogging. For you, I mean.

Which reminds me, tonight was the first night of Getting Shit Done Around Here. I made appointments, asked for quotes, set up online banking accounts, made and ate an actual dinner.

There's lots of stuff I didn't get to - aquarium stuff mainly, didn't go for a run, didn't get anywhere near doing the piles of clothes in my bedroom. But a few significant time-sensitive things have been crossed of the list.

I'm trying to be okay with all this, to let the angst come and let it go again. Realistically, this crazy bananas systems breakdown is not going to change until I get moved in. The details might - the new tank will get set up, the old one sold, the books sold, the CDs too - but new piles will take their place until I get to a point where I can begin adapting old systems to a new environment.

Not the kind of situation I thrive in, but meh. 'S the way it is. Even with the busted can, I'm still several steps up from surviving.