Greetings from Michigan

I am no longer a resident of South Bend. Or of the State of Indiana. (Insert Hallelujah Chorus here.)

Well, folks, I'm all moved in. It was a long and arduous weekend of packing, lifting, hauling, loading, and unloading, and of dragging furniture around in the new space, but I had plenty of amazing help with the heavy stuff on Saturday in the forms of Meg, Phillip, Pete, and a huge U-Haul (when did I get so much stuff? when?), and then yesterday I spent at the old apartment packing the rest of the things that there were neither time nor boxes for on Saturday, and yesterday evening I turned over my keys, paid the last of my dues, and made my old landlord sign a paper releasing me from the lease (having learned a thing or two in the course of my understudy as my lawyer's Secretary).

And then I was done.

I feel like I have a new lease on life (HAHAHAHAHAHA, I crack myself up). My new house is cute, small, cozy, and just about perfect for what I wanted. My yard is huge, both front and back, the neighborhood is barely a neighborhood, practically rural, and although the road itself is pretty well trafficked, the area is so beautifully quiet. And safe. I don't remember the last time a neighborhood felt safe. I actually left stuff on my porch yesterday and all night, and it was all there when I came back. There is no longer a shotgun under my bed. When I need something, I can jump in the car and drive the three minutes to town (like coffee in the morning -- I don't know where the French press went, so I've been climbing in the car in my pajamas to drive to McDonald's for my a.m. rejuvenation). It's the small town mentality -- something I haven't had since I moved away from North East.

And it's so amazingly wonderful to be the only person residing in the house. No footsteps, no loud conversations, no music, no TV leaking in through the walls. No sudden fluctuations in water temperature when I'm in the shower. No worries about my own noise. It's incredible.

Of course, that part is taking awhile to adjust to -- yesterday I would drop something on the floor and it would thud and I would automatically think, "Oh, I hope that doesn't bother...oh. The spiders." Because there's nobody underneath me. Hooray! And this morning in the shower I kept tensing, waiting for someone to flush a toilet, or run a kitchen sink...and then remembered that unless I could split myself in half or break all the laws of physics and be in two places at once, that wasn't going to happen. It's. all. mine.

My front porch is huge and great, with a nice enormous sloping overhanging roof, so no more getting wet when I step outside. The house is set far back from the road, so it's not an invasion of privacy to sit on my porch and enjoy the day.

Simon is adjusting much better than I had thought. Saturday he was confused and upset (and I had him in his crate for hours, who wouldn't be upset? but I didn't want him scooting out an open door); once I let him out, after the furniture was all moved in, he wandered among the castles of boxes and yowled pathetically and slunk about kind of afraid. But as soon as I started making the bed, he relaxed. He loves that bed. When I'm at work, he spends all of his time there napping and whatnot, and he shares it with me at night, so I imagine that for my kitty, bed = home. And so I'm guessing he figured out, Okay. She's making the bed. It smells like her and it smells like me. She's sleeping here. We're staying.

I still have so much to do. There are so many boxes that there's barely room to move around. I didn't realize how efficiently I had managed the limited space at the apartment so that the amount of stuff didn't appear to be extreme; but once it was all in boxes, I stood around looking at it going WTF? And now it's even worse because I have to dig through it all to find anything even remotely simple. And the rooms are smaller than my apartment, so there's less maneuverability.

But I have the skeletal structure of each room arranged (except the bedroom, I'm still feeling out the feng shui there), and it was delightful to eye my furniture and put out my feelers in the room and try to figure out what the room and the furniture were telling me about where they belonged. This is the great thing about houses -- if they're good houses, good living spaces, they talk to you. You work with the house to get everything organized. And your furniture helps out. It's kind of like tuning in to someone else's conversation, being a third party mediator between the space and the stuff. (Okay, the couch doesn't like being next to the writing desk, but the window is telling me that the writing desk belongs in front of it, so let's move the couch to the other corner of the room and see how the easy chair likes the corner by the writing desk. Oh yes. They're happy. Great.) So organic and lovely. I love arranging and decorating.

So my bookshelves are all beautifully arranged in my study, with the computer desk (which looks out the window, hurrah!); and the living room with the huge easy chair and loveseat and writing desk are in harmony; all of my curtains will work on my windows (SO. HAPPY. about that, I worked hard on those living room curtains); now I just have to negotiate all those damn boxes.

There are things I'm fretting about already -- I have to come by a lawnmower and a snowblower and a rake at some point in the near future, as well as change the tires on my car, and where do I have the funds for that? -- but God has provided so amply and QUICKLY for all of this, so I'm holding to hope and deciding not to panic until the first snowfall.

I'm exhausted beyond all reason, and every muscle in my body protests at my slightest movement, like my whole body is saying to my brain, "You want me to do what? Fine. I may have to respond to your electrical impulses sent along the nervous system, but I don't have to be happy about it." I'll be moving around like a little old lady for the next few days: I strained my knee and my back has a few choice things to say to me about its treatment and my feet are blistered and sore and Charlie horsing constantly and my shins are bruises from my ankles to my kneecaps.

But it was worth it. I have peace of mind, a quiet haven, and no more freaky neighbors. Or if they are freaky, they're distant.

And a study. Did I mention I have a study?

I'm quite satisfied. Even if I'll be living out of boxes for over a week.