nine days

Nine days left. Needless to say, i'm a little overwhelmed.

This morning, i bought plane tickets for my little sister & i. Originally, my plan was to buy a car for the two of us to drive across the country. However, after weeks of scouring the classifieds & craig's list, i came to this conclusion: any car in my price range would not make the drive from Kansas to Florida. I imagined it would lead to some grim scene involving the two of us sitting prettily atop my vintage suitcases along the side of some backwater highway in Alabama (great for cinematography, bad for personal safety.) So, after factoring in the billions of dollars i would spend in gas, i finally decided to fly.
When i first went to Southwest's website, i found a nonstop flight for $70 ($90 after taxes.) Right before purchasing, i called my mom to try & beg a rental car out of the deal. Ten minutes later, my flight was no longer available at that price. Naturally, i freak out & i spend the next ten minutes on the phone with my sister, searching for cheaper tickets. We found another set, even cheaper on USAir, but after factoring in the $25 charge for your first checked bag, we would only be saving $10 over the SW flight. So, $10 seems like a pretty good deal to take 2x the luggage & avoid a layover that would add 3 extra hours to our flight time.

Flying puts a concrete restriction on how much of my belongs are making the move (a restriction that factors in both weight & area,) four full-sized suitcases (50 lbs each,) one carry-on suitcase, & a purse. Wow. While that does seem like a lot, especially as i am moving into a studio apartment (already occupied by my best friend, her belongings, & her landlord's belongings,) ponder the complications of specific items i had planned to move:
- sewing machine
- juicer
- violin
- record collection
- typewriter
- books
So the next week is going to be like a giant puzzle. How to evenly distribute the weight between my four suitcases, while still leaving room for my clothes. I'll grant you it's frivolous to take these things rather than clothes & towels, but lightweight boxes are cheap to ship, & a sewing machine is not lightweight. And what about my violin? It would have to be my carry-on, which would eliminate that as suitcase space. But i am not panicking. I am just going to look at it like a nintendo game. A fun game that will determine how much of my stuff can live my new life with me.

escape velocity

In the twenty-six years that i have been alive, i have lived within twenty-six miles of where i was born. From four to seventeen, I attended the same school district. My parents & grandparents still live on the land where I was raised (where my own mother grew up.) The past nine years are the only i have spent living in a city, a college town of about 90,000.

Now, i am in the process of extricating myself from Kansas to live with a friend in the Florida Keys.

Anyone who has ever lived in & moved from a little oasis is surely empathetic to my situation: excited to leave, terrified to be gone, & effing tired of talking about it. Obviously, the constant dialogue about the perfect weather & the ocean view is helping to keep my spirits high, & is a definite nudge towards optimism. However, working as a barista in a busy Downtown coffeeshop, i have started to feel like a broken record.

Besides the obvious resident-turnover that will accompany a Big-12 state school, there is a constant ebb & flow of townies who all have the same Dorothy desires. It is expected that you will move. And when you do move, it is expected that your take-off attempt will fail, & you will return, tuck-tail to the motherly embrace of her limestone alleys.

Unlike a lot of others who have come & gone in the years i have been here, i love this town. It cannot be overlooked, the obvious drawbacks of living in a university town: alumni, greeks, basketball, football, freshman, art students, business majors... Undeniably, the suffocatingly exponential expansion of the 'west side' is only getting worse. And, a small town, is a small town, is a small town. We may not be rural, but Downtown is tiny enough that everyone knows everything, personal & otherwise. The frequent farewell parties all share the same refrain, 'I'm just so tired of this damn town.' & 'I can't stand any of these effing hipsters anymore.'

Ridiculous. I have the most incredible life i could ask for here. I haven't owned a car in seven years, everything i need is within a five block radius of my amazing apartment in a pre-civil war house, & there is convenient & reliable public transit for the rare occasion when i am required to leave Downtown. We have a lively (albeit wheezy) art scene, & most importantly, the ability to sustain one's self by 'living locally' (groceries, restaurants, shops...) It's a town where you can barter! A community where you all live & work nearby, therefore, you know everyone! I lead a blissful, luxurious life here. I fully intend to come back someday to grow old here.
While I have yet to make any kind of decisions concerning kids & career, I feel safer assuming that someday I could have one or both of those. So, why wait until having them binds me irreversibly to the Midwest? I am aware enough of the passage of time to recognize that the now is an opportunity to save myself from becoming an elderly woman who settled down without exploring her options.

Mostly, I just hate winter. I hate being cold. I take it as a personal affront. As if every bone-chilling breeze, & soul-crushing ice-storm is an attack on me, as an individual. For a third of the year i wear long-johns, thermal socks, undershirts, sweaters, gloves, boots, a coat, & a thick scarf. It's suffocating! Not just the scarf over my mouth & nose (or the frozen air when scarfless,) but the layers & layers constricting your movement & rendering you as unsexy, & uncute as possible.
Do you know where they don't have winter? The tropical islands known as the Florida Keys.
And what they do have in the Keys, besides beaches, palm trees, sunshine, & crystal clear water? Weather that allows me to wear sundresses for two thirds of the year.

Ha.

Remember that time i decided to start a blog, & then immediately abandoned the idea?

Oh yea, that was last year. Don't worry, i really mean it this time.