Wednesday, 14 August 2002 | The sound of settling

It still feels like I'm traveling, that in a couple of days or weeks or months it will be time to jump on a plane or load up another truck and head south. I guess it will take starting work (which happens tomorrow) for the vacation feeling to pass.

Since arriving on Saturday (it took two days to get here, rather than the anticipated one), I've been learning my new neighborhood through running errands—picking up food, finding the local hardware store, buying wood and paint and metal, exploring the night life within a ten-minute walking radius. Already, bike riding has been transformed from a leisurely activity into my most efficient mode of transportation (along with the subway, of course), and my legs and feet are being educated for their new, more active role in my life. They are teaching me that they're slow learners.

I haven't heard any birds or squirrel screeches or tree frogs or crickets. Instead, it's drills and saws and horns and the heaving of large vehicles as they accelerate and the music box tinkling of the ice cream truck(s), which seem(s) to drive past my window every half-hour or so. Oh, and the howls of my cat. I'm not sure what to do about those. I'm tempted to give her a treat whenever it happens, just to make her stop, but it might have the opposite effect in the long run. So far I'm enduring, petting, talking.

The first two days of the move were the worst in terms of not knowing what to do with myself. There were too many projects and not enough time or hands, and I couldn't find anything. It felt almost as if I'd just started a new job waiting tables, and I didn't know where anything in the restaurant was located. I hadn't memorized the list of salad dressings, all of the patrons looked strange and unapproachable, and I had been dropped off in the midst of the lunch rush.

Fortunately, Martin generously helped: drive the truck up from NC, build the stairs to the loft that my housemate Bil had constructed, build a closet, patch up the walls, empty boxes, explore, keep me from getting overwhelmed. Now that he's gone, in addition to there being a Martin void, I'm faced with spackling, sanding, painting, and building, using my own (decidedly more awkward) methods. There is still so much to do, but I'm no longer in that lunch rush. That promptly ended with the creation of a closet and the organization of my CDs.