About two weeks back, my roommate commented to me, “I’m thinking of moving.” It was an off-hand comment, and, truth be told, it was something that had entered my mind for a while. When was I going to be able to move? I had just taken a week-long trip back to Kentucky, so there was a week’s worth of missed wages that I was having to overcome in the short term. I had the holidays coming up, and that meant I could squeeze more hours out of work to help offset that. January I’d be getting a bonus and have the payroll schedule fall to where I could squeeze a third paycheck between the first of January and the first of February. January is going to be my birthday month too. What better way to celebrate another year in this world than to plan a move into new digs. January it is. I’ll tell her soon so she has ample time to figure her situation out too.
Last Saturday, I was watching the Louisville football game. A very early kickoff because they don’t pay any mind to the fact that some fans could possibly have moved to a more westernese time zone where an early kickoff meant that I had to be up before 8 AM to watch the game.
Phone rings. Roommate. I’ll call her back after the game.
Message. I listen. “You know how I said I was thinking about moving? I am moving. I talked to the manager, and she said we don’t have to give notice. So, I can move out by the 1st without paying rent for December…” Not sure what was said after that, really. My head was swimming. My roommate was leaving the apartment in 10 days. I can’t afford to live here alone, which is why I had a roommate to begin with. What the hell am I going to do?
I called my best friend (who was also watching the game). He had a hard time concentrating on what I was saying due to it being the 4th quarter. Once I broke through that, we talked. We agreed that the worst case scenario would mean me sleeping on his couch until I found a place. So, there was that. Not ideal in any way, but it was certainly an option. I wasn’t going to be out on the street.
My next move was to go the route of Facebook, that wonderful social medium that was so eloquently depicted in the recent movie, you know, the one about the group of assholes with really great dialog. I get a reply in a few hours that a friend of mine that I used to work with had a room open in his house.
Let’s skip the boring bits. I meet up with him at the house. Give it a look over. Analyze the neighborhood. Meet the other housemates. I like them, and they don’t hate me. So, that’s a match. I have to fill out an application and pay a fee. I find out I can’t pay the fee over the phone, so I have to go to their office… in Santa Clarita… the week of Thanksgiving.
This is where I shout out to Jeff Allen. A great guy I work with who on Thanksgiving Eve offered then followed through with a ride to Santa Clarita so I could deposit the money and application in the office’s mail slot. He did this braving traffic of people driving out of the city for the holiday and facing the ire of his girlfriend who was holding dinner for him because he spent three hours on our excursion. He didn’t expect the traffic on the way out, but to his credit again, he didn’t just turn around and say, “Sorry, I didn’t sign on for this!”
So the day was approaching that I had to move out. I had to work every night, and I had taken on a very persistent cold. I never get sick. (In this instance, “never” is defined as “hardly ever sick enough that I would admit to it”.) The cold kept dragging on, sapping my energy and wreaking havoc on my sinus cavities. I believe this was brought on and allowed to continue due to a combination of lack of sleep, stress that comes from not knowing where you’re going to live next week, and a sudden cold snap in Los Angeles.
This morning (Monday) was my first day I didn’t have to work, and I have all day to get my stuff ready to relocate. I just didn’t know where. Last night, sleep came hard with the anxiety keeping me awake. Maybe it was the decongestant pills that kept me awake, but the anxiety sure wasn’t helping. I had made it through another night of work while being physically beaten down by this cold. I was home, but couldn’t relax because I still didn’t know where I was going to go with all the stuff I was planning to have packed up.
I woke up a little later than planned this morning, but I woke up to find a glorious text message. “so your all good buddy. You can start moving in” I have never been so happy to get a text message in all my life. I have even spent countless hours railing against texting, but not today. I spent about an hour giving everyone the news that I was indeed not going to be homeless. Now, I’m taking a break from packing up all my belongings to post a blog entry.
The topic for the week was “vague unease”. This ordeal could qualify I suppose, but I would describe it more as “acute” than “vague”.
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