My mother is on a roll this week. Today she called me at work and when I told her that LunchBoy and I moved more of my stuff over to his place yesterday, she got very quiet in that, “I have an opinion but I’m not going to tell you what it is” kind of way. “Didn’t you say that you weren’t going to move in without a commitment?” she asked. Then, when I got a little snippy and said, “Why can’t you just be on my side?” she came back with, “I have always been on your side. I just don’t want you to get hurt again.”
Oy.
She’s right. I did say that about the commitment thing. But I also believe very strongly in letting things develop organically, not according to some arbitrary schedule imposed by one person on the other. And LunchBoy knows this. We wouldn’t be taking this step if we hadn’t covered the territory.
That said, I’m keeping my apartment. We’ve gone back and forth on this issue. My lease is up at the end of May and he wants me to get a subletter because it makes no sense to pay rent for a place where I only spend about 2 hours a week. Financially speaking he’s right, but for me it’s more complicated than that. While keeping the place might be expensive (though I only have one more rent check to write), it’s worth it to me to avoid pressure: Pressure on me to get my stuff out now. Pressure on us to adjust immediately. Pressure from outside parties to move ahead at lightspeed. Moving in gradually gives us the room to make sure what we’re doing is right without making anything irrevocable. And if there’s any similarity to Christina and Burke on Grey’s Anatomy, it’s completely accidental.
Underneath all that, though, is my attachment to my apartment. When I was little and I had a bad day, I used to go home and crawl into bed with my favorite book and read under the covers. My apartment is like a big version of my bed. It’s warm and safe and cozy and vaguely womb-like. It’s where I got back on my feet and started my life again. After leaving LA and living with my parents for so long, it took a lot of work to get my independence back and that’s not something I’ll walk away from unless I know that I’m taking the important part with me into what I do next. Virginia Woolf had a point about the whole room of one’s own thing.
Happiness and fear are a heady mix. My mother worries, I think, that I’ll let the fear outweigh the happiness. Too much Showtime will do that to a person. But I can acknowledge an emotion without giving in to it. I can try to keep my head about me. I can keep taking steps forward.
My Osho tarot card of the day: The Lovers.
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