Stories About Moving

After two weeks of packing, a long day with a moving truck and a few friends, three days off to unpack, we have now been at our new place for more than a week and you can finally walk from room to room without having to do any special contortions to get around something that is going to go somewhere else. We've even had a friend over for homemade pizza.  Not that there isn't more to arrange, discover, move around, share.  In a few days I will have a postcard to show you and maybe some photos of out lovely little place.  For now though I wanted to share five favorite moving moments I thought of while packing our place up and shifting it a few miles down the road.

1.  In 2001, leaving Savannah for Seattle, I was trying to clean up the last of our things at 2 am and I threw away $500 in cash.  The mistake was realized in the morning.  M's persistence led to a 30 minute search of all the garbage cans as the car was otherwise ready to go, stuffed to the roof with bikes, a table, and Andrea, who was catching a ride to Philadelphia via my mom's house.  M found the money, and, despite the anxious car, we walked down the street and got sandwiches before leaving.  I apologized but I also stubbornly held the belief that one who gets paid in cash shouldn't leave it in an unmarked envelope in a room full of unmarked envelopes.  Of course, one who throws away $500 shouldn't make excuses either.

2. 2012 leaving New Orleans for Oakland: Andy drove to one of the only grocery stores with ice for cold beer to offer friends as we packed a moving truck 2 days after a hurricane, while most of the city didn't have electricity.  He arrived back at his place to find me drinking elderberry vodka and water and packing and brought me ice cream despite the lack of refrigerator to store it.  Luckily, Eric showed up soon after and ate the rest of it before it melted. 

3.The one time I was ready on moving day, 1997, leaving Allston, MA, splitting my belongings between a youth hostel in the Back Bay of Boston, where I was an overnight front desk clerk.  I was lucky enough to have a room with only one roommate and we had separtate bedrooms and our oun "kitchen" : a hotplate and a toaster over.  But we were in the basement and surrounded by alcoholics.  Perhaps knowing this might not be a good move, half of my stuff was going into storage at my dad's place in New Hampshire to be retrieved 4 months later when the city and moreso the hostel living, depressed me too much so I loved to the New Hampshire seacoast.  Which was also depressing.  But when my friends arrived in the morning to help me move out of myAllston apartment, everything was boxed, labeled and I already had iced coffee.

4. New Year's Eve, 2010, Baton Rouge. The first of 4 days of moving as a freaskish cold snap hit the south and we didn't know how to turn ont the heat.  We figured out the stove, ate pasta, got dressed in shiny things, rode half across town to a party, got drunk, told Andy it wan't raining, rode home. It was raining.  Woke up cold, damp, hung over, on the floor of our new place (the bed frame was still at the old place). Still, it was a good place. Did I mention it was the time we moved to Lover;s Lane? Really.

5. July 4th 1996, Derry NH. A few weeks earliter, I moved out of my first apartment with a sleepover. Had requested teh elecetricity to be shut off that day but forgot that might mean 2 am so we could't watch the end of the zombie movie or vacum the industrial carpets.  I stayed with my dad for 3 weeks then was offered a bunk bed at a friend's apartment.   I drove a car full of my stuff, probably mostly summer clothes and books and my typewriter over to his place and moved in. His parents lived 30 miles away and let us stay there for free. The downstairs was haunted by a ghost or a demon and so we had to take out laundry to the laundromat in town. 

Ok, enough reminiscing for now.  It is late for me and I might have to get some sleep so I can fold and send 150 postcards tomorrow.

World Class Procrastinator

 my favorite milan park

There should be awards for this.  Though I have been getting a lot of other things done today, even if my paper is not written.  After watching 2 clips of Family Ties on youtube, I realized I should at least go and enjoy the day.  There is a smartly-placed gelato stand between the park and the church piazza in my neighborhood.  I favor the park because, at this point, it feels like an old friend.  Now I know that the looking orange building is not abandoned but a library.  The park was filled with teens in the grass, daughters strolling with their mothers, and me.  I have been reading Primo Levy's If This Is a Man  angry that I had not read it earlier, that I had not heard of it, and I wonder if I would've understood it earlier.  The horror of it is not in the dramatic retelling of atrocities but of the lack of drama.

In other procrastinations, after Italian class the other night I went to the cafe near school with the lovely garden seating and had a glass of wine and drew.  While I did, the waiter stood at the bar and drew my table from his perspective.  One day I will have many drawing to share with you.

cloister at Santa Maria della Grazie

And for my last short story, I am preparing to leave Milan, physically and mentally.  I like it here but I am ready to be moving.  It is a lot to think about and the other day the thoughts came too fast so I returned the the cloister at Santa Maria della Grazie to see the frog fountain.  Thanks, guys.

Looking Through the Books

At home I have a giant old dictionary I found in my studio space in New Orleans. I keep it partly because it is an excellent paperweight and partly because it has great secrets hidden inside. Not just the definitions of english words but newspaper clippings and scraps of wrapping paper. How do I recreate this greatness while far from home? While posting aa million postcards you sent to me last year, I have rediscovered old letters and these two images I took with my camera one day. Hello LSU outside the studio at night (why wasn't I at home) and cat-on-desk. There are still a few hundred postcards to post but stay tuned. I'm getting there.