Fond farewell? Fuckfare.

This is the last blog entry that will ever be posted via Linksys wireless router at 1660 Davidson Street. When we meet again, dear reader(s?), it shall be via Comcast. From a room with blue walls and trees outside its windows.

Goodbye, Davidson Street! Goodbye, Loma Linda! Goodbye, shirtless guy riding a tiny bike in my driveway when I got home! Goodbye, panty bandit! Goodbye, freeway noise! Goodbye, tamale wagon! Goodbye, perpetually unfixed potholes! Goodbye, dirt curbs! Goodbye, Semi with your banging and loud Spanish-speaking outside my window at 6:30 a.m.! Have nice lives, all of you!

And hello to a whole new set of woes, no doubt. But at least they'll be fresh ones.

So Sarah's signing off. Sans sighs. Splendid.

*click*

countdown

I have five (5) more nights to spend on Davidson Street -- tonight, Tuesday and Wednesday, and next Friday and Saturday. The rest are at Shirley's, and then on the 14th,

I am moving. I really am.

What a thought.

Thomas has his plane ticket. There's a party being planned for him by his friends. My shelves are CDless and my closet almost clothesless. Notice has been given, taken, and received by all concerned parties.

Five more nights on Davidson Street. Wow.

Vive le Toot

So it occurred to me that the day I officially move out of Davidson Street -- July 14th -- is

BASTILLE DAY!!!

Appropriate, non?

Does my deposit check having been cashed confirm my move? It's official all the way to the bank, as far as I can tell.

I haven't actually implemented any evacuation procedures, but here are some of the plans which have at least been taking shape in my overwhelmed brain:

-Get rid of even MORE clothes and shoes

-Push the tall dresser Shayna offered me (already in the room) into the closet (her idea) and store my foldables in it

-Buy 2 huge CD wallets and transfer all my disc-bound mediae into them, storing the cases in cardboard boxes on the top shelf of my new closet (a project that can be undertaken at Shirley's house when I'm stuck there for 3 days straight from July 4-7)

-Purchase under-bed plastic storage containers for papers, stationery, office supplies, fabcocks, sentimental old notes from Mamobs, et cetera

-Ship Suzanne's big wooden chest, dollhouse, and several of our grandma's paintings to Vermont (Suzanne has already provided $200 to this effect)

-Take with me my small dresser, two small bookshelves which will primarily house BOOKS (imagine!), and find a smallish but comfy armchair and ottoman on craigslist to position in front of the giant window and thereby be able to bask in dappled sunlight in my own quarters

-Leave ebay-sellable items in Matty's temporary custody

-Have a giant effing yard sale at Davidson Street for the rest of this junk sometime in the latter half of the month

-Proceed to have a nice life!

Does that sound like it will work?

It's getting hot and foul in the IE after a month of blessed "June gloom" and I'm so glad I won't have to spend another suffocating, vermin-infested August here that I can hardly believe it's really happening.

And tomorrow it's Patti LuPone, Mandy Patinkin, Baker's burritos, and Adrian. And afterwards, I'm driving him home to Santa Monica and taking my evening exercise at the sun-setting beach instead of underneath the dim fluorescent lighting of the San Bernardino gym. It shall be my last day of leisure for a good spell. Wish it well. That would be swell. Or my name isn't Isabelle.

New Digs

So yesterday, I found (hopefully and crossing all fingers and toes and hairs that nothing goes wrong) a place to live.

Shayna responded to my email inquiry on Thursday night, and I just knew. Apparently, when she read my email inquiry, SHE just knew. She called me Friday morning and we gabbed like a couple of gurls, which I suppose we are. It's nice, that. As much as I heart menz, I really don't want to go home to a sausagefest. Eight years of submarine movies and excesses and deodorant-smelling soap was quite enough.

Driving from the freeway to the house yesterday afternoon, I went by

1) the hospital where I was born, and

2) a large, old cemetery.

Portentous? We shall see.

My heart leapt as I saw bike lanes appear on the road in my maybe-new neighborhood. The closer I got, the bigger the trees got, and the thinner the traffic got. It was no Westchester but it sure beat Davidson Street.

Shayna met me out front and led me through her be-Jetta'd garage to what would be my room. My blue room. And sizeable bathroom. Both with trees and green outside and shady sunshine pouring in.



See?

You might also see, if you press your nose up against the monitor, that there is a hill on one side of the condom-inyum and a large, empty field on the other. To the north is a retired guy who keeps an eye on things, and to the left is whoTF knows, but they didn't make any noise while I was there, so for now they're just fine by me.

And so the check's in the mail and I have (95% fer sure) less than one month to remain in residence on Davidson Street.

Amen.

Prospecting

Here's a housing prospect that's a bikeable distance from RCC in a neighborhood with well-kept old houses, sidewalks, and big trees (just none at THAT house in particular):

Look, I did html!

It's also near a TJ's and a Clark's health food store (sister store to the Loma Linda one where I go for Amy's soups and Cascade Fresh yogurt. and Kettle Chips, but that's beside the point).

Between that kitschy kitchen, the stylish paint job in the pool table room, and the red ribbons beneath the windows, I'm hoping that the house is owned and inhabited by a middle aged gay man. In any case, I will make inquiry by phone tomorrow.

Altima is loaded with old clothes for delivery to Shirley's (and from there to Hoving Home).

Mitchell was informed of my plans to evacuate Davidson Street tonight. He also tasted his first gooseberry jam (via scone) and helped me invent a marinade for some tuna steaks (they were outrageously good, restaurant-worthy even). And we played Debussy and talked at length about all kinds of things, including my plans to move. The first thing he said was "But you're going to stay in the general area, right?" and he asked that same question several more times in the course of our discussion. I assured him that I would be, at least for now. And I'm glad there will be something to miss about CA, if that makes any sense.

I'll give my notice to Semi on the 1st and hopefully move into something during July while Dad and I finish up here. Dad can have my Southwest credits if he needs them to get here. If he doesn't get here, his stuff is getting left at Davison Street for Semi to haul to a dump. I am a cruel and heartless daughter.

And that is where we are today -- well fed and well planned. Wish me the strength to carry it all out! Literally, in the case of the furniture and such.

Week 1, Day 1: The Clothes

Today is Tuesday. By Sunday, ALL clothes that do not see regular wear will have been removed from my home. This might sound simple enough. But if simple is what it sounded like to you, then you might want to check your ears for cockroaches.

My strategy was certainly clear enough at the outset. It went something like this:

Don snorkel mask and flippers. Dive into closet. Furiously swim my way out, flinging everything in my way into one of three designated locales on Bed Isle: Hoving Home Hideaway*, Keep It Cove, and Junk Junction.

But when is anything ever that tidy, Mamob? In this life, anyway. Well, in this house, anyway.

The Hoving House pile was easy; there were plenty of things in good condition I hadn't worn in maybe 5-10 years and clearly never would again. Also into that pile, in an exhilirating fit of reckless abandon, went quite a few things I have worn and loved in the recent past but which now sag with no stone to support them. So if I gain much weight back, I'll have to either wear garbage bags and gym pants or else buy new clothes with what oughtta be my moving money, prolonging my stay in the Inland Empire. Doesn't that sound like an excellent incentive for getting to the effing gym? Three bulging Hefty bags full of alms for the poor by my front door bellow a satisfied "YES!"

Anyway. It was the Keep vs. Junk dilemma that proved the most perplexing (and I suspect will continue to do so throughout this process). Into the "Junk" pile at the foot of Bed Isle went:

-a pair of shorts my mom made me for me for tap class when I was 14. They were awesome and made of funky vegetable-print fabric, but torn and too small now. Sigh.
-innumberable cast t-shirts from high school musicals, most torn/stained from extensive wear at rehearsals
-other mildly sentimental old t-shirts in less-than-perfect repair,
-a shrug I paid 45 dollars for and never wore that got snagged on something and had a hole in it,
-the bra I was wearing the first time Matty and I ever had sex. In his 2000 Honda Civic. When it was new. In a WalMart parking lot.

Yes indeed. They're all out in the trash can now. F'reals. I wouldn't want someone to try to give me their used bra or stained t-shirt, after all.

If I had normal parents with a normal house and a normal almost-paid mortgage, these things would all have gone into their basement and I wouldn't have had to throw them away until I was middle aged. Oh well.

In the end, of course, there ended up being a Dilemma Dale. This includes:

-a Mrs. Potts nightshirt that my mom made for me when I was maybe 12-13 (still fits; used to love it; hadn't seen it in YEARS)
-the "READERSAURUS: SAN BERNARDINO PUBLIC LIBRARY" t-shirt that I was wearing when I won first prize overall in my school science fair in the 2nd grade ("Can Plants Grow Upside-Down?")
-the stripey shirt I was wearing when you came down the escalator at LAX on 12/31/05. I'd love to be able to take it off for you one day.
-a fluffy little cream-colored dress that I loved at 16. It was from a store run by Indian people and has flowy fabric and pretty embroidery and little buttons and always made me particularly happy. I went to plays with friends in this dress. I wore it as part of a costume for my acting class at UCSD. My mom helped me find a minimizing bra so it would fit me because it was the only one the store had and she saw how much I liked it. I tried it on tonight and barely squeezed into the bodice, but even if it fit properly...it's short and light and resplendent with youthful beauty and innocence. It's like the sartorial equivalent of a spring blossom, and it belongs on a virginal 16 year old girl with glowing peach-rose skin and waist-length golden hair, not on a voluptuous, jaded, almost-30-year-old woman with a bitter streak. And asymmetrical legs (it's very short).

And so forth.

In the "Keep It" pile, there is a skirt from about 1995 that was at the veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery back of the closet, and it's in style now. It wasn't then. Apparently I was "boho chic" a decade and a half early.

Also initiated tonight: an ebay stack (three dresses, a scarf, a wool coat, and a pair of new-in-box Dansko shoes that don't fit) and a "free stuff" stack (craigslist will be in order, methinks).

Cliff's stance as of 2 hours ago: giving away my fat clothes is "stupid" because I "will gain all the weight back," and I'm not moving anywhere but at least my house will get a good cleaning.

Savings account balance: $13.01. That one will be updated monthlyish.

And now, it's off to the gym with me. And if you're off to your basement gym: happy shvitzing, thank you for reading, and goodnight!

*The Walter Hoving Home For Fucked Up Women is where one of of Shirley's granddaughters has been in residence for over a year. It gratefully accepts donations of clothing.

Good morning, Mamob!

Welcome to Sarah's seminal blog entry!!! Yes, THAT Sarah. The one with all the seminal ins and outs.

I've created this little bulletin board on one of our mutual internets so that we can both track my progress toward 1) the evacuation of 1660 Davidson, 2) the habitation of less expensive quarters, preferably on a street with sidewalks, or at least curbs, and maybe even a tree or two, and 3) my migration east.

As I sat here amid mountains of clutter tonight feeling utterly overwhelmed at the task ahead of me, it seemed like a good idea to write down what steps I've taken toward my goals, both for the sake of accountability to someoneTF and so that, even ambling amid the shambles of my shitty shared shack, I might be able to see the forest through the trees. Or the New England trees through the stacks of old magazines and 12-year-old running shoes, and past the sentimental eyes of a thousand adorable giraffe doodads all given to me out of love over half of my life.

*shovels giraffes over edge of ravine with bulldozer*

Thank you for coming with me on this epic life transformation. Or maybe even just for looking at this half-assed blog that'll trickle away into empty server space like all my other endeavors always have. Either way, I know you'll still love me. And that's why you're invited. Let's dance.

Okay, then. Let the minutiae commence!