Do you see what I did there? Do you? As you can
clearly see, I waited a long time to post again because I wanted you to feel an
approximation of how anxious I was to hear from The Aspen. So that you could
feel how waiting for information or news can gnaw and tear at your insides. So
you could feel my pain. What? You think I’m lying? You think I just didn’t get
around to posting, or I forgot? Of course not, I say! Look, I have irrefutable
proof for you right he---*throws smoke bomb on the ground and runs away*.
…
*huf * huf
* huf * Okay I’m back. *Wipes sweat from brow * Anyway. When last you
read, I had just submitted Alex’s and my application for a two-bed one-bath
rental lodging place at The Aspen Apartment complex where the two wonderful
ex-Grinnellians, Jessica and Elyse, currently reside. The only plot device, I
mean potential complication, was the battle that the combined incomes of Alex
and Gigantor had to wage against the robust income requirements that would
assure the acceptance of our humble requests to live in paradise. What I didn’t
mention before was that I had been working a data-entry temp job during the
whole application process. Now, for those who don’t know what data entry is,
it’s the most boring, repetitive and mind-numbing
process in the whole arena of temp jobs. And do you know what can make a
mundane task ten times worse? Waiting to hear about something very important
while completing the task. For a week of entering names and check numbers, I
sat in my swivel chair, staring at a computer screen, my heart a flutter, and a
light sweat covering my face and bored out of my mind…
Side note:
If you think I’m writing with too much of a dramatic flair, that’s because I
realized while writing this post that the stuff about the actual moving
processes is going to be very dull. Nothing super exciting really happened,
beyond the general overall excitement of moving into my first real place, and
spending time with wonderful company. So bear with me cause it’ll be boring
soon…or I guess maybe just stop reading. Up to you)
…I
knew I was waiting for bad news, but I didn’t know if good news would come with
it. I knew there was no way in bejesus that we were going to meet the income
requirement, but I had great hope that they would let mother cosign and give us
the place anyway. And, for lack of a more dramatic outcome, that is exactly
what happened. At 4pm on Friday, I received a phone call from The Aspen. It
went a little bit like this:
“So you didn’t quite meet the income requirement,
but if you have a cosi—“
“I HAVE A COSIGNER. MY MOM WILL COSIGN. WHAT DO
YOU NEED ME TO DO, WHAT DO YOU NEED FROM ME? WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME!?!?!”
She gave me a little list and I immediately called
my mom. Good thing too because if I had called her after she left work, she
wouldn’t have been able to get me in time the two paystubs I needed for her
cosigner application. I was actually sleeping over at Jessica’s apartment that
night because we were attending Elyse’s grandfather’s funeral the next day. So
I swung over to Churchmanor to get the stuff I needed from my mother and turned
it in on Saturday morning.
On Saturday we actually had a little time before
the funeral to stop into a Mattress Discounters, so I could start to get an
idea of what kind of heavenly sleeping pad I would want for my new place that I
was assuming I was going to get because the universe could not possibly that
mean to me, right? RIGHT? Luckily the nicest older man was there to help me. I
lied (lay, laid, lie in past tense, does this grammar rule ever make sense?!)
on the three sample beds, feeling super silly, while Jessica and Asia wandered
around the store loudlyishly telling me “Get this mattress” “No! Get this
mattress”. I walked out of the store, with a smile on my face, and fantasies
about what my new room would look like when I was done with it. I would say I
tried not to get my hopes up, but I totally did.
And that turned out to be okay because the
universe was nice and I got a phone call a few days later telling me that
everything had checked out and we could move in our previously-tentatively
planned move in day.
I immediately started packing and buying things.
Being the huge procrastinator that I am, however, I waited two days before
moving in to buy a mattress and bought all my bedroom furniture the day before.
Alex came with me to IKEA on Friday. I could easily go into a rant right now about
how much IKEA weirds me out, and how manipulative the way it is set up is, and
the annoying warehouse where you have to blow out your back to get all of your
stuff into a measly cart. But instead, I’ll sum up my feelings with a brief
scene from 30 Rock where Liz Lemon goes into an IKEA with her boyfriend. An
IKEA worker comes up to them and says:
“SILENCE PRISONER! I mean… Hello valued costumer.”
On Saturday morning I packed all (most) of my
moving stuff into father’s Scion (Mother was on a business trip that weekend
and could not help me move in), and drove off to my new abode. While I signed
the fifty page manifesto/my lease my dad started carrying stuff from the car to
my apartment. Luckily, Alex and I were moving into a room on the first floor.
Every place at the Aspen has a balcony, or in our case a patio, with sliding
doors. This made moving larger objects into the apartment a relatively painless
process. Alex arrived about thirty minutes later than me. After I helped my dad
with the last two big bins of my stuff, I left Alex to be on IKEA delivery duty
and went back to my childhood home. This time I left my Dad there and took the
last of my stuff to my new, shiny, undecorated, largely empty, apartment.
The first real step to moving in was painting my
room, which I had decided I wanted to do to help with the nesting process.
Earlier in the week I had bought a wonderful not-quite-purple, not-quite-blue
color paint. At that time, my slave labor came down to help me start getting
settled in. Did I say slave labor? I meant my wonderful, helpful friends,
Jessica and Elyse.
Though neither
really enjoys painting—not that I really do either—they selflessly helped me.
I, being a tall freak, was in charge of painting the tops of the walls while
they took care of almost everything else. Sadly I was not quite tall enough to
make it a painless process. My arms were quite tired by the end and my part
definitely lacked something--like enough paint. Overall, I was super happy with it though. Jelyse
also helped me assemble a few things that same day (the IKEA stuff had come
while I was at home picking up more things), before I went back to Churchmanor
to sleep for I not yet had a bed.
On Sunday, Asia joined the assembling party, and
through some delegation of work, we assembled, a bed, a dresser, and a
bookcase. After dressing the bed, we all took turns pretending to sleep/be
murdered on it, to celebrate our accomplishments.
The moving and settling in
continued for the rest of the week. Jessica helped me figure out what I needed
from Walmart, and Target, and BJs for my kitchen and food needs. I went to a
few hardware stores to get everything I needed to mount my bookcase and dresser
to the wall, so they wouldn’t fall over and kill me. Long story short—funny how
that saying always come at the end of a long story—I spent days putting things
in their place, organizing everything, and falling in love with my bedroom.
I had moved into my first apartment as a (sort of)
real adult. It was nerve racking, it was exciting, it was excellent. And good
news, I still love it. With Jessica and Elyse seven floors up, how couldn’t I?
T H E E N D
BONUS STORY:
I realized I forgot to mention another part of the getting ready to move
in story. I will include it here, so as not to break up the excellent flow
of my perfectly organized piece of thoughtful writing. On the night before move
in day, I went out to dinner with Papa (pronounced in the British way), with
the secondary goal to buy a new TV for the apartment. I had finagled my two
move in gifts with the Churchparents. Mother payed for my mattress, while my father got me a new TV. We stopped in an HHGregg and pretty quickly picked out a
television. Easy as pie… Except, that particular TV was out of stock in their
store. Therefore, after dinner, we had to drive out to a Fairfax HHGregg
located in the Fair Oaks Shopping Mall. See, Easy as pie…Except, here’s the
thing: there is no HHGregg in the FO mall. After calling Alex for directions to
where the store really was, and stopping at a gas station to get further clues about its whereabouts after we got lost
using Alex’s directions, we finally
found the store we were looking for.
The HHGregg on Fair Lakes Drive. Thank you helpful, fully-informed sales associate at the Arlington branch. Let’s
just say, going on a two hour road trip/maze was not the way I thought the night before move in day would go.
I was kind of worth it though because my TV is beautiful and has helped Alex
and I play hours of video games. Now that’s what I call a happy ending!
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