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In light of the 90+ degree weather finally arriving, I was in my bedroom packing the winter clothes out of my closet. Chris had gone to bed half an hour earlier and the house was quiet. This was my first official box, and filling it was harder than I�d expected.
The sound of the front door opening startled me. A sweatpant-clad Chris stood in the hall. �What�s up,� I asked, surprised to find him out of bed. �I just wanted to see what all the sirens were for,� he muttered, looking out onto the street. �They�ve been keeping me awake for the past ten minutes.�
I laughed. Until he mentioned them, I hadn�t noticed the noise at all. After he shuffled back to his room, I picked up my drink and sat on the front steps.
The sirens weren�t the only commotion. A neighbor�s television blasted news through one window, while Dave Matthews drifted out another. Someone up the street exited a house and started a motorcycle, heading down toward Hyde Park Ave. A train whistled through the Forest Hills station. Maggie, the dog from next door, sniffed around and then barked to be let back in. It's all noise I've stopped noticing so much--it's become the background music of my life in JP, and it's all about to go away.
My tea grew cold in its mug as I drank in the beautiful night.
I love living in the city. Specifically, I love my apartment. Yes, it�s got bad wallpaper and cracks in the ceiling, and I don�t have a real bedroom closet, and Chris is a pain in the ass, but it�s been home for seven years, and I wouldn�t trade those years in it for anything. It�s got great neighbors, and a porch for the hammock. Free laundry in the basement. The coldest refrigerator in the world. An easy walk to the T. The Forest Hills Cemetary right around the corner, which means e. e. cummings and the bell tower, as well as a kick-ass lantern festival every summer. JP Licks a doable walk and even quicker drive. The Dogwood at the bottom of the street. Perfect party layout. A yellow kitchen. A slightly-insane-but-easy-to-get-along-with landlady. And more memories than I can count.
Here�s where Steve, Erica and I sat on his bed and watched Buffy for the first time. It�s the same place where we laughed until we cried at the boy from Michelle�s bachelorette party who tracked me down and called in the middle of my telling them about him. And where, after that same bachelorette party, Erica and I came in to find Steve and the Artboy, home far earlier than us, waiting on the couch to hear about Colin with one �L.�
Here�s where Jamie-the-Take-Your-Pants-Off-Man sat at the Bad Fashion Statement party. Here�s where Adam terrorized Chips Ahoy, not far from where I decided to drink blender drinks until I threw up or passed out (or both, as it turned out). Here�s where Phil and Eric convinced one of my first roommates� party guest that they were from Collective Soul. Here�s where I screamed into the phone so loudly at the Artboy that Sebra came down from upstairs to make sure I was okay. Here�s where the Artboy got on his knees and begged me to give him another chance. Here�s where I told the Boyfriend, who was dressed in a moose hat and red long underwear at the time, that I needed to figure out what I wanted without being his girlfriend. And here�s where I changed my mind on that.
Here�s where I sat and recovered from my first snowboarding expedition. Here�s where we celebrated the first Friend Thanksgiving. Here�s where we found out Melissa was missing. And close by, where we found out she�d been found. Here�s the mashed potato stain on the wall, made later that night in the midst of the spontaneous food fight. Here�s where I found out I had two sisters. Where I found out my grandfather had died, and where I was told my grandmother had cancer. Here�s the first location of my Big Girl Bed, brought home the night of the Jordan�s Furniture Incident. Across from there is where the Artboy and I decided to use the Purity Test as a list of things to try.
Here�s my closet, full of City Girl clothes I haven�t had much need for lately. There are my rollerblades, which have carried me on many occasions through the aforementioned cemetery. There�s the green star pillow the Artboy dubbed city-appropriate, positioned under the star light I had to buy, regardless of the price. Over here is the end table Brian liberated for me from his ex-girlfriend�s apartment, next to the round kitchen table I inherited from my grandmother�s basement, the first piece of furniture my parents bought in the early days of their marriage. Here is the hutch Steve, Erica and I bought for the kitchen, our first joint purchase and the piece of furniture over which they fell in love while building it. Here�s where they finally told me they were a couple, after I�d sworn I�d never live with two people who were romantically linked again. And over here is where they asked me to be part of their wedding.
So much of my life.
When I first came through the door, I was a scared kid. I�m still scared, but I�ve grown up so much in that time. And my life has changed so much.
Letting go of the Me that lives here is so very hard. It means closing a door on a huge chunk of my life and the different possibilities that go along with it. When I leave here, it�s to go to the Boyfriend, to see him become the Husband, and to give up the hold that my past has on my head. The memories settle into a different category then.
I talked to the Artboy by email today. Sitting on the porch last night, I almost called him. It was a very Artboy sort of moment. My whole relationship with him had that soundtrack.
He and I have been trying to find a time to meet for lunch for a month, but our schedules haven�t meshed. He suggested dinner. Our schedules still didn�t seem to match. He threw out Sunday night. I told him I�d be in the Apartment, packing. He�s supposed to call me. He said that if I was willing to risk the toilet overflowing, he�d come help.
I had to laugh.
When the Artboy and I first met, he was getting ready to move from one house to another. I went over one afternoon, about three weeks after we�d started dating, to help him pack. We got three shelves of books into a box before we ended up on his floor, wound around each other and partly dressed. My mom and David were away for the weekend, and I�d promised myself that I wasn�t going to sleep with him until we�d been together for a month. Somewhere in the midst of his boxes, I broke that promise. It was impossible not to. I was amazed I�d made it that far.
Before I�d quite made that decision, while I still had on more than my socks but after we�d stopped moving books, a huge commotion rose up outside his room. �Oh SHIT! Mother fucker! Shit! Shit! Shit! My�SHIT!!!� Brendan, his roommate, had gone flush the toilet and had it overflow onto his feet. Not exactly romantic background music. It didn�t seem to faze us, though. We managed somehow anyway.
Later, we walked out to the kitchen where his roommates jokingly said, �And what have YOU TWO been doing?� Absolutely deadpan, the Artboy said, �Packing.�
From there forward, he would look at me and say, �hey baby, want to help me pack?�
I had forgotten about that.
Yet another thing I leave behind. So much of him in the Apartment. It�s like the Supermetro. In moving out, moving on, it seals the Artboy box into the past. And while I�m not sorry about that, it�s still like losing a huge piece of me.
This is so hard to explain. Because I don�t want the Artboy. And I don�t have any reservations about marrying the Boyfriend or lingering questions about whether I made the right choice. It�s something I need to leave behind. And I�m ready to do that.
But it�s final. And it feels so strange, letting go of that.
Given the choice, though, I choose to go. Regardless of what that means. Because I can�t imagine not having the Boyfriend. I can�t imagine waking up without him. And I wouldn�t trade my future with him for a lifetime among the Apartment�s memories.
That�s all they�ll ever be�memories. And being stuck in your memories is wrong. There�s too much life to live. And I�m looking forward to that life.
Forgive me, though, if I�m feeling a bit self-indulgent over these next couple weeks. They�re the last ones I�ll have here, you know, and I have a lot of places to revisit before I close the door that final time.
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