Category: Uncategorized

If we could all hear one another’s prayers, God might be relieved of some of his burdens.
— Ashleigh Brilliant

So sorry for the lack of posting this past week. Moving and then Comcast screw ups left me without internet until Tuesday night.  But here are some things I’m grateful for:

1. Aimee, my oldest and best friend, whose optimism and hopefulness never ceases to inspire me, and whose family could really use any good thoughts and prayers you could send right about now.

2. Being slow to get started on something you’ve been putting off, but once you get started, feeling like you’re on a roll and not wanting to stop.

3. Angel, by Jimi Hendrix:

What about you?

And if tonight my soul may find her peace
in sleep, and sink in good oblivion,
and in the morning wake like a new-opened flower
then I have been dipped again in God, and new-created.
— D.H. Lawrence

1. Rolling into the space where the other person was when they get out of bed

2. The way it feels to put your hair up when you come home from work, after wearing it down all day

3. Double-decker bus tours (which I maintain are the best way to see the sights of a place in a short amount of time because you buy a one- or two-day ticket and then you can get on and off as much as you like for as long as you like) – like this one I took in Nice, France (and of course I rode on top – it’s the only way to do it):

(That’s my dream house, by the way, on a cliff overlooking the Mediterranean Sea)

What are you happy about or grateful for today?

Now the seats are all empty
Let the roadies take the stage
Pack it up and tear it down
They’re the first to come and the last to leave . . .
But when that last guitar’s been packed away
You know that I still want to play
So just make sure you got it all set to go
Before you come for my piano
— Jackson Browne, The Load Out

Last Wednesday night, my apartment looked like this:

(Sorry for the quality – these are from my phone because my camera was packed!)

At nine Thursday morning, movers showed up, packed up the truck, and hauled all my worldly possessions four blocks to the two-bedroom townhome-style apartment that David and I will share officially as of this Saturday!  That’s the big news I alluded to in the last post, and it’s really exciting!  We’ve been talking about moving in together literally as long as we’ve been together, and David’s lease is up this month, so we figured out a way to make it work, even though my lease wasn’t up til August.

I guess it might seem silly to hire movers to move four blocks, but we couldn’t move this past weekend because we had to be out of town, and they wouldn’t hold the apartment for us an extra week, so I had to move during the week.  That meant no one could help – even David had to work – and I have some large furniture that I definitely couldn’t have moved on my own.  Plus, with movers, it took one trip instead of the 10 or so it might have taken me on my own.  It was totally worth it, and I’d be surprised if I ever move on my own again, it was that easy.  If you need to move in the D.C. area, let me know and I’ll give you the name of the company I used – they were great!

We move David this weekend, and we should have plenty of help – Karen and my brother are coming up and we’ll have a couple of local friends to pitch in as well.  David has less stuff than me, and less big stuff (except for his giant TV and his bed), and we plan to move batches of stuff over this week so hopefully it won’t take too long on Saturday.

The new place is both good and bad.  A lot of what I don’t like is just the change from what I lived in for so long, and we all know I don’t do change well.  Like, there’s no room for the salt and pepper on the back of the stove – which is just where it goes – in the new place because the microwave is much lower over the stove.  And the apartment isn’t renovated, so the appliances are older and smaller than the ones I had and the microwave doesn’t have a turntable.  Lucky for me, they make a thing called a Micro Go Round.  And there’s not enough cabinet space in the kitchen.  But is there ever in an apartment?

But I love that it’s two bedrooms, and we have ceiling fans in the bedrooms, and the guest bedroom has a big window seat, and parking is way better at the new place than it was at my old place, even though it’s in the same complex – we’ve never had any trouble parking, even late at night.

But the best part of it, of course, is that it’s ours.  Mine and David’s.  And this is just the beginning.

If I’d known how much packing I’d have to do, I’d have run again.
— Harry Truman

Sorry for the late post – big happenings around these parts lately.  More on that later.  Here we go:

1. Hiring professional movers instead of trying to do it all yourself

2. Oscar speeches (for the record, I think Dustin Lance Black – Milk screenwriter – gave the best speech of this year’s awards)

3. The skinny Crayola markers

What are you happy about or grateful for today?

The car has become a secular sanctuary for the individual, his shrine to the self, his mobile Walden Pond.
— Edwin McDonagh

1. Books on tape (CD or MP3 now, I suppose) that make long drives go faster

2. That feeling you get in your heart when you’re watching someone you love who doesn’t know you’re watching

3. The sound of rolling thunder

What are you grateful for today?