moving on

Finally mourned my old apartment last night. I hadn't till then -- I was too tired, stressed, and forcing myself toward gratitude for the enormous change in circumstances. But the truth? I have missed my apartment. I lived there for two and a half years -- nearly the whole of my independent adult life -- and I made it into a lovely home. I had everything arranged perfectly; I loved the cast-iron, claw-footed bathtub; I dearly loved the wide-open, spacious, sunny kitchen; I enjoyed living on the second floor; I liked my large living room. The walls and the ceilings and the nooks and the crannies and I all got along very well together; the floor and wall space was expansive; it accommodated itself beautifully to all of my decorating ideas. I loved Saturday mornings in the peace and the emptiness.

My house is tiny. The windows all face the wrong directions for letting in light. The floor space barely exists and the walls are cramped. The kitchen is small and dark, the refrigerator weird. A dankness pervades all the rooms that I don't have enough money to heat really well to drive out.

Of course the biggest practical factor remains the change in environment: The house is safe. The apartment was not. I unquestionably love the lack of noise in my home that I don't create myself; I do not miss the television buzzes, loud parties, thundering footsteps on the stairs, and arguments that had become the norm in my apartment house, nor do I miss the break-ins, drugs, creepy people and broken security door. I love my wide, gracious front porch and the short drive to work, and I enjoy being able to sleep without ear plugs for the first time in...well, two and a half years (although the isolation itself can be problematic...the grass is always greener, right?).

But that's only the practical. The attachment was to the apartment itself, and I do miss that. Lacking a camera, I don't even have any pictures of the way it used to be.

Naturally in my nostalgia I forget how small and cramped the apartment was beginning to feel toward the end; I had grown tired of living in an apartment; I wanted a house. It would have felt a lot nicer had the events of my move not been so frenzied, chaotic, and swift; I had no time to grieve a little, or say goodbye.

So last night I grieved, and this morning I felt more kindly toward the house. It's not, and never will be, the apartment, which I still miss; and I don't plan to spend two and half years in it; I'm looking forward to home ownership, as soon as I can afford it. But it's still a good little place. I can do a lot with it; have already started to do a lot with it. And I think that the advent of summer and later light will cut down on the small-dank-and-dark feeling.

Everything's a process.