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Packing

Submitted entry: I’m definitely getting in to the swing of packing now. You can tell by the fact that I’m sitting in front of the computer drinking coffee and writing an entry.

Yesterday, though, I was really good I spent the better part of the day packing and cleaning the Albuquerque apartment. Most of the things we’re donating to charity are already at Goodwill. Most of the things that aren’t worth keeping have been tossed out. What remains now is to go to the store and get some boxes when they open in an hour and then pack the rest of our things up. And then clean like crazy. Unfortunately our vacuum here died and the apartment rental folks haven’t gotten around to delivering another one. Which wouldn’t be bad if we weren’t so bad about vacuuming before the vacuum died.

Meanwhile, Sage and I have had just about enough of this being apart thing. No, not for that reason. Okay not just for that reason anyway. It seems that when we’re apart for too long and out of our normal routine we both turn into seperate halves of Richard Lewis. So now we’re both going through huge bouts of worry. Sage about health - hers and Paul’s. With very little reason to worry. Worries like “If I drink too much caffeine and don’t eat enough I get dizzy and shaky.” abound. As if it isn’t something that hasn’t been happening since at least 1995! (searching the archives is really helpful for things like this - like your own memory but better)

Me, my worries are financial and automotive (now that I haven’t my tonsils to worry about anyway). So now I worry that we’re not really making enough money to get by in Toronto. And worrying that our Mercedes will have a catastrophic failure and I won’t be able to get to work and we might not be able to afford repairs. See? Just putting those two sentences together makes the worry seem silly (though if you do know a good and inexpensive Mercedes mechanic in Toronto I’d love to hear about them). Seriously. It’s an eye opening thing. When Sage and I are in the same room and one of us starts worrying the other is right on it with reassurances and usually a reminder that they haven’t eaten more than a small pastry and a pot of coffee in the past eight hours. And we get through it. But with half your brain 1,000 miles away and facing what I would probably say was one of the top five changes in our lives together it is easy to forget to take care of yourself. And I think in a strange way worry is some sort of sick entertainment for the mind. Can’t you see it? If you’re lazy (like we are) and are sitting somewhere procrastinating and you don’t have a TV you can get into brood fests that are not unlike channel surfing.

“Hmmm….Let’s see what’s on…
(click)
Plans for move? Too much thought required…move on
(click)
That time you embarassed yourself in 8th grade? No - too painful…move on
(click)
That time you were wronged at the yurt? Too much potential to generate bad karma and likely break the car…move on
(click)
OOH - a Lifetime movie about a woman with health problems…Let’s watch this!”

And so it goes…At least for Sage - I tend to watch the Financial News Network. I think in many ways it is more nervewracking than the Lifetime Movie. After all, not only do I get the feature program on professionals who can’t pay their bills, I get the lovely newsticker underneath showing estimated bills and income. Unfortunately the sources that FNN uses, in my mind at least, aren’t very reliable and when not fed can make things up out of whole cloth just for ratings.

In these past weeks alone in the apartment I’ve been trying to figure out a social life. Not that I had time for it until the past week or so. What I’ve determined is that there are precious few options for married (but not physically together) people in a city to find things to do with others. Sure there are churches and lectures but for conversation? Not so much. It’s not like you can ask that really cool person at work to dinner or a movie - too complicated whether they’re a man or a woman as in my experience there really isn’t a historical social precedent. What we really need is a revival of the Salon. Cities should have several of them for various types of people. A place where you could just go, pick up a coffee and just jump right into a conversation with people without getting a strange look from them.

So today’s to do list looks like this:

- Drop off toys/clothes at Goodwill (done!)
- Pick up boxes
- Pick up cleaning supplies
- Clean
- Pack
- Ship some of the packed boxes back to Sage, take the rest in the car
- Take a drive to Santa Fe to give the car highway driving to ensure that the last major repair (oil leak) was successful
- Stop at the audiobook store

This last one is hugely overwhelming though it should be the easiest. See, Sage rented a bunch of audiobooks back in September. She didn’t bring them back and took a few home with her on the drive to the Ozarks. Meanwhile they’ve been calling and I’ve been placating them while trying first to get the ones back from the Ozarks (finally picked them up on my last trip) and then procrastinating. I imagine the fines will be huge. And rightfully so. But that isn’t why I don’t want to go. The reason why I don’t want to go lies totally in the fact that the owner there is very stern. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that the reason she has an audiobook store is that the library she used to work at let her go for being too stern with the patrons. Anyone want to go in my place?

Good morning, Representative Shays!

If only I lived somewhere else…