Movin' Up

EPS and I have signed a lease; we're on North Avenue and I love the apartment. The bedroom space is small, though and so I am worried that my parents are going to judge it. I worry a lot about those kinds of things; stupid, I know, but either way. The neighborhood is "urban," something I've been looking forward to and let's face it, I think I deserve some things in an apartment that I looked forward to since the first time P and I had to deal with a leaky ceiling. It's time to move to the city, which I'll be doing post-Argentina.

The parentals have been waking poetic and sentimental about the move, about my graduation with the EdM and about how I'm leaving them. I wasn't quite so sentimental about it until they started in on me. Started in sounds aggressive, and that's not how I mean it, but there's a conflict inside of me. On one hand, it's humiliating to have to call and say, "I'm not bringing the car home tonight," when I decide to stay with CA. However, it's nice to know that someone cares. Like Margaret Meed said to have someone want to know where you are at night is a very basic human need. Perhaps this is where I am; caught between being responsible in the sense of having CA or someone else need to know where I am and not being able to be mapped at every hour of the day and night.

I've taken to leaving my phone on vibrate, or tonight, leaving it in the car when I've walked in the house. I don't need it on me all the time; I refuse to be that reachable. It feels desperate to check email too much or wish that the world would call me. So, I've stopped trying too hard to care. Many people like SR don't even like cell phones. Hate them in fact. So why, why do I feel the need to be so reachable? I'll stop it.

In the very last Sopranos episode (which was amazing, by the way...), Tony takes his daughter Meadow to dinner. She asks him what the occasion is and he responds, "Well, you're going to get married and then we won't do this anymore." I think parents, including mine, have a sense of finality about things. My mom believes that if I move to the city, she and I will never, ever play cards together again. Or my dad believes our Sunday morning breakfasts will be defunct. So I've been trying to be more participatory with them, and argue less. We go get soft serve, go for long drives and eat dinners on the back porch. I'm trying to be present for the times that I can be present. But, they don't need to see my moving out as some kind of slamming the door.

I said to CA, "I can't understand how someone can be 23 and not want to find a job, find a path, find someone to be serious about and find a way to function in the world." He agreed. So, this is what I am doing, finding a way to function in the world. Looking at cars (ie Jeep Compass or Jeep Patriot or the Minicooper?) and looking at making insurance payments. It shouldn't be such a big deal to create a budget at 23. Or to go to the doctor alone. Or to take clothes to the dry cleaners.

There's also the fear of retreat. I know they'd welcome me back with open arms. But hundreds of millions of people have had to begin to leave before, to make that trek with shit in their car. There's the famous last scene from Six Feet Under where she leaves; I'm not going across the country. Im heading half an hour into the city. I'm scared I won't be able to budget; I'm scared I'll come home every weekend people are busy. It's time, AXR. It's time to stand up and not be scared. I want to talk about things like lives and futures. Then it's time to accept them.