This morning, I moved out of my parents' house. For good, that is. Like many people, I halfway moved out to go to college, but I still had a bedroom there, and clothes, and books, and the address on my driver's license. But now all that stuff is here. Not the license, I mean; that doesn't expire for another three years. Or the books, which are mostly still in a box in the basement in Wisconsin. But my bed is here, the bed that's lived in my parents' house since I was little, and I'm kind of regretting bringing it now, because it doesn't belong here in my new apartment in Michigan. Not that it really belongs in Wisconsin, either. It's the bed of a little girl that no longer exists.
Am I a spoiled white girl for getting sentimental about things like that? There's nothing especially sad about this move. I'm not an orphan or anything. I'm plenty old enough to be on my own, and at least I have a place to live. And a job, which I'm starting on Monday. But for today, I'm in a transitional phase. Tomorrow, I will probably explore the town a little and buy some things I need. Tonight, though, it's a little eerie in this place, too clean. And dimly lit. I really need to get a floor lamp or something. Everything is unpacked, because what else am I going to do with my time when I don't know a single person in this city yet.
I mean if you want to get technical, I know the hiring manager that hired me. But she's presumably at home with her family. I could go to a bar or something, because it's Saturday night out there in the world, even if it doesn't feel like it to me. It doesn't feel like any day of the week. The Egyptians used to have this weird calendar where there were thirty days to a month and twelve months to a year, which multiplies out to 360, but the extra five days didn't belong to any month. They were called the epagomenal days, or the intercalary month. During that time of the year, people just kind of chilled and got ready for the coming year. That's what I'm in now, my intercalary month. It's like a vacation, except not.
Right now I'm huddled in my old blue flowered quilt in my incongruous twin bed, and I might as well go down to the corner bar, because I'm sure not going to read any more of this book tonight. Once my dad left this afternoon, I got groceries, and I cooked myself dinner around six because I was bored, but it wasn't very good, just a chicken breast with salt and pepper and frozen carrots and plain white rice. God I hope my cooking improves over the rest of my natural life span. And then I decided to read one of my Adult Books that I felt deserved to come with me to Michigan, but it's very dull, something from AP Lit that I always wanted to understand but never did, and now it's nine and I'm kind of craving a beer and a messy plate of nachos. And, you know, to talk to a human being.
What I need is a group. Not necessarily an amazing group of best friends for life that I can tell anything, because that shit takes time. Just a few people that also don't know anyone here that I can go to the movies with. I had a group like that the first month of college, whom I eventually dropped for various scattered people I liked better, but with no real ill will. Eventually the people I liked better turned around and dropped me. Such is life. Hopefully when I start work, I'll meet other freshmen in life, and we can form a little lifeboat to hang onto for awhile.
I go down to the bar. It's called the Coldwater Grill. The waitress is pleasant but not friendly. I order steak nachos and try to eat around all the random nacho detritus I don't particularly like. There are three old men at a table nearby, loudly talking about the Indy 500, and no one else. I think I picked the wrong bar. Whatever I thought was going to happen here isn't. I finish my bad nachos, pay my tab, and go home.
At home, I check Snapchat and Facebook. Nothing too great, just a pregnant acquaintance posting ultrasounds and Jackson all excited about seeing his high school friends at some minor league baseball game. Jackson and I never dated, but I always feel a little jealous when I saw stuff like this. He never posted any pictures of himself with David and me. Maybe because we never left campus, but still. Actually none of us ever really took pictures as a group, or posted about what we were doing. We weren't much for pictures, or for assuming anyone cared about our midnight game of Settlers of Catan.
I might tell you about Jackson and David later, but maybe I won't bother. They were not special. Our friendship was not special. I'm not going to be godmother to their future children. They were people I shared space with. They've probably already forgotten about me.
Once I create my lifeboat, I resolve to take a picture of all of us and post it with a fun caption so that everyone feels special. We will do lots of wholesome community stuff like volunteering and rec league softball. We will have a favorite diner and a favorite staff member at that diner. I will organize events, and people will come to them. It is much easier to believe in things like this during Intercalary Month.
I shut down my laptop and try to read a few pages of literature. Tomorrow morning, I need to go on Craigslist and find a couch. And get a library card, because I need some Terry Pratchett books. Crime and Punishment is about to make me kill myself.
