A Limbo Large and Broad

So here I am, stuck in one place but wanting desperately to be in a different one.

I decided probably early to mid summer to commit to moving to Connecticut and starting over there. I didn’t look for apartments, I didn’t look for another job, I didn’t do anything but save money and try to figure out how much the whole thing would cost. Then my brother drops the bomb: he and his wife really aren’t ready for my parents to come and visit (which they were planning to do around the end of July), much less read for someone to come live with them. Would it be alright for more to wait until December? With maybe five sentences my brother effectively crushed my plans. I was faced with the unwelcome task of finding an apartment within a month, preferably something cheap, and with as short a lease as possible.

Well after a bit of searching I found a reasonable place, I guess. A small (500 sq. ft.) semi-studio (bookshelves separate the bedroom from the living area) for only $330/month plus utilities/bills. And they allowed a six month lease (pretty rare in a college town) with minimal deposit and even the first month free. A good deal, right? I signed my lease and got my key yesterday. Using a friend’s car, I packed up a few boxes and happily took the first of my possessions over to my new, if temporary, home. Last night was when the doubt really set in.

At about 2:30, maybe 3:00 in the morning I woke up with an intense regret at having signed the lease. See, my original plan was to move at the end of the fall semester, around Christmas when my parents had decided they were going up to see my brother anyway, thus ensuring Christmas with the family, and even a little extra moving help if needed. With the new lease, I was stuck in the place until January 31st, a full month and a half later than I wanted. On top of that, if I broke the lease I’d have to pay not only the rent for the remaining months (which I expected), but also the difference between the rent I was paying and the market value for it (about a $50 difference per month = $250) AND the month they’d given me for free in the first place. All totaled, I think it comes to about $624, plus the rent for January and December since I have to give them sixty days notice. That’s a hell of a lot of money to spend when you’re trying to move across country, and when your place of work is closed for a month in late December/early January for winter break.

So a new idea came to me after all this information rushed through my head so early in the morning. The company that owns the complex offers a 30 day money back guarantee if for some reason I’m not satisfied with the management, grounds, construction, etc. This means I can get out of my lease if I fill out a form within 30 days. It’s a like a godsend for the indecisive. So I can get out of my apartment that I’m regretting, thereby possibly saving money. But I bet you’re wondering, where will I live? Am I doomed to wander the streets until December, living in the school union and washing myself in the public restrooms until my moving day? No, such is not my fate fortunately. You see, I can suck it up and go live with my parents or grandfather in a nearby town until I can move up there. Granted, this would mean I would have to open every morning at work (so I’d be at work around 5 or 6 am), but I wouldn’t have to pay rent or bills for those roughly five months. I could save potentially $3000, maybe more. Add that to the extra money I would have after expenses anyway and I could have a nice chunk of change saved up for my move. Besides, living with my grandfather, I could butter him up a bit and try to buy his very nice car from him for cheap. He’s legally blind, he doesn’t need it anyway. The only thing I’d have to pay for is the days I had the apartment, my use of the electricity/water, and of course food at home.

Don’t get me wrong, though, this isn’t exactly a wonderful option. My parents/grandfather do not have internet, and I know that will kill me. Also, getting up and being at work so early will certainly wear on me all too quickly, not to mention being away from my friends with no car right now to get to them. But I talked with them, and Susan has already mentioned that it wouldn’t be a big deal to spend the night every once in a while so we can still hang out and everything. It’s really the social aspect of leaving and living with my family that’ll kill me, but I figure if I can’t deal with it here, how am I supposed to handle it when I’m 2000 miles away?

So you’ve heard all of this, and you can make your own judgments. But there’s one more thing: I may have met someone who lives in Connecticut right now, only a half hour away from my brother’s place. He’s funny, smart, and passionate. We have a lot of the same interests, and he’s wonderfully mature for his age (22). While we haven’t been talking that much, there could definitely be something here. While of course I’m not going to base a big life decision like this on one guy I just met, it is something to consider. I’ve perused the personal ads around my bro’s place, and there are some very good prospects. A lot fewer hicks and rednecks, you know?

And that’s all the information I have right now. I’m going to talk to my parents about it either over the weekend or early next week, and I’ll be sure to get some information from the apartment complex on Monday, just in a sort of reconnaissance mission.

*     *     *     *     *

Hmm…  As I’m sitting here watching my friends (and a few random casual acquaintances) play a Star Wars RPG game, I can’t help but wonder if I really can leave them to live my own life so far away.  I’m only an observer in this game, not a player (not really my thing I guess), which tells me they’ll be fine without me.  But what about me?  How do you make new friends, especially close ones like those you have now?

Home Sweet Home?

Well, it’s almost 11:00pm on Sunday night.  I’ve been back in Oklahoma for twelve hours now.  Super happy fun time for me, as you can guess.

I went to Connecticut over this past week, and despite the fact the I had to get up at 2:45 (central time) to catch my flight this morning, I thought I’d share a few thoughts about it.  First of all, I was surprised at just how much I liked it up there.  The last time I went to see my brother and sister-in-law was two years ago, and I remember having the impression that there were too many highways and not enough things to do near by.  It seemed like everywhere we went was at least twenty minutes away.  Now I kind of see that as a blessing.  My brother and his wife live in a fairly quiet neighborhood in Bristol, but so many things are just ten or twenty minutes away.  You get the serenity (at least some level of it) and the advantages of city life at the same time.  They’re a half hour from Hartford, there’s plenty of shopping and restaurants around, and (big for me right now) a branch of the University of Connecticut is only fifteen minutes away.  By the end of the week, I was trying to figure out how to get my stuff up there.

So while I was up shootin the breeze and hanging out, I visited two graduate departments at UConn (social work, and public policy).  While I pretty much knew what to expect with the social work department, I found that my hour long meeting with one of the administrators of the department of public policy to be very encouraging and even enlightening.  We discussed the classes in detail, the philosophy of the department, trends in what current students were studying.  I told her that I was thinking about working with gays and lesbians, either in a civil rights avenue or a counseling method, and she was on board with that.  After that meeting, I started wishing I could take courses there and get my masters in public administration, and take enough courses to be certified as a licensed counselor as well.  I’d something that’s near my brother since I’ll be staying with them until I find a place, so maybe I’ll looking into some other surround schools.  I’ve also thought about a dual degree with public administration and social work, but who knows if that’ll pan out.

If someone were to ask me what I did on my week long trip, I’m not sure what I’d tell them.  For the most part I just hung out with my brother and sister-in-law and piddled around town.  We went to the movies, out to eat, to the mall for a bit, to different shopping areas, and even to a Titanic exhibit in Hartford.  I guess the biggest thing we did was go to New York City on Saturday to spend the day, but that’s only a small part of why I had a good time.  The longer I stayed there, the more I came to like the area and the possibilities that it could hold for me.  There’s museums, restaurants, shopping, new people, new ideas, bigger cities (come on, New York and Boston are only a relative hop and skip away)…  Even French Canada is accessible, as I found during one of my meetings.

But now comes the hard part.  How do I make the final decision to get my ass up there and, more pragmatically, how do I find the means to get all my stuff up there without it costing an arm and a leg?  Do I buy a car here and haul it myself, or do I get a U-Haul?  Leave a lot of stuff behind, or take everything I own (which is my first inclination since I’m somewhat of a pack rat)?  And what about my friends here?  While I was up there I had these wonderful visions of me inviting some friends up to see my new apartment and to let me show them around the area, maybe go to New York for a day…  But at night, when I had more time to think, I wondered about the things I would miss out on here, and how hard it’s going to be for me to make new friends.  I’ve had the same friends since high school, some of them since middle school.

But I won’t let myself dwell on stuff like that.  I’m trying to stay positive.  My sister-in-law is very optimistic about all this and is really excited about me moving up there, so I’ll try to channel her for a while.  Anyway, it’s getting kind of hard for me type anymore because I’m getting so groggy…  Maybe I’ll write more tomorrow.  I’m always thinking of something to write, even if I don’t post as often as I’d like to.

-Liridon