big changes and small spaces
Here lies the end of an era—a fever dream, sugar rush, roller coaster of a year that really began last May, with an excursion to steal some fresh University soil for a soon-to-be dear friend's new succulents.
Last week, Alex and I, with the help of several wonderful friends who were also in the middle of relocating, moved from his house on Ophelia Street to our current apartment in North O. Our square footage has decreased by at least a third, but that's just fine for me—preferable, even. I told my mom: one great thing about small spaces is that it takes less time to feel at home in them.
We chose this apartment pretty late in the game, and it was only one of two we actually toured. The time crunch + COVID meant that we didn't know much about it—just that the previous tenants seemed clean and responsible, and it looked to be a good size for our purposes.
Upon move-in, we've found that the place is full of little refusals. The wiring is old, so we were told by management that if we run both AC units, we risk blowing a fuse. The fridge and dishwasher face each other so neither can open all the way. The knobs on the kitchen sink were installed backwards.
But the walls are yellow, there's a built-in bookshelf in the living room wall, and the bathroom is charming and perfect. I've hung up my fairy lights and my post cards—Alex has brought his plants and set up his desktop monitor. The dust has begun to settle—the fact of its rising made evident in our more frequent sneezing our first few days here.
Here's what I've left behind: long days, gossamer-light, that unwound by book, by show, by song, by snack. The back porch with South Side dappling the hills, turned galaxy post-sunset. The morning I watched a rain shower roll misty down the river for whole moments, before I felt the first raindrops of its arrival. The Big Dipper just-visible directly overhead, a clutch of friends arranged on the rooftop below.
Been known: that adulthood isn't a one-stop revelation, but rather a piece-meal transformation. First I'm working a job after school, paying for the gas in my own car. Then I'm picking out my own apartment, signing a lease, spending a half hour on hold with the electric company. But I won't (thank God) get kicked off my mom's health insurance until I'm out of grad school—and so it goes, one foot in, one foot out. So progresses the gradual incline of almost-adulthood, woman-child, imperceptible in its going—but how steep it seems looking back; how steep it seems looking forward.
As I progress along this continuum, I find that one marked difference between youth and adulthood is the decreasing fanfare of Big Changes. This fall, I won't pick a back-to-school outfit (I haven't in years), or take back-to-school pictures (haven't done that in even longer). Birthdays have happily shrunk to a really good dinner, a call from Mom, a visit from a friend. And this has all been hastened by social distancing and shelter-in-place.
As I settle into this new apartment, I remember something I learned, maybe in a podcast, about how our memory crystallizes around Big Events. How a month can blur by if we're doing the same things over and over again, but a week-long vacation to somewhere new can burn in our memories forever.
I've been really lucky this past year or so to have met so many new people and experience so many new things, or return to what I used to love. I've been lucky to have a year that really was one big vacation, so to speak—new and new and more new, memories that divided and multiplied, blended and expanded into a collage that glows like a firebrand at every thought of it.
This week, I have orientation for classes at grad school, and my responsibilities at Carnegie continue to grow. Friends pursue and secure Real Actual Adult jobs—my younger sister will start her first semester of Laptop School at a university near home. Despite the fears and violences of the wider world, the uncertainty of the pandemic, we are lucky that our lives bloom and whither and bloom again.
I wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the new era ahead and commemorate the old, miraculous one behind me. No need for a fancy graduation dinner, or a birthday bash, or a house-warming party. This handful of paragraphs does the job just fine.
I grew up, along with so many kids before and after me, with constant encouragement to dream big. To aim for the prestige job, the many-roomed house, the awards and prizes (Of course, I also realize the privilege in dreaming big; that for some, the biggest dreams include simple stability and safety). But in these past few years, this past year especially, I learned how I could be excited for this apartment—how to appreciate home and delights in a small space, clarity and joy in the little things.
Like home-cooked dinners and laughter at a new TV show. Walks to my friends' house, now just a few blocks away. Padding through the courtyard and the gate and the shade—curling up on the recliner with a really good book. A well-crafted sentence. A comfy old button down, a ginger chew, and the living foliage just outside our window, bobbing in the breeze.