Relocation

Writing from the new apartment, 350 miles from the city where I grew up and have always lived. I have a new job--which I am thrilled about--and I know there will be a new life opening up around me. It's all very exciting but melancholy at the same time. There were so many farewell dinners and parties and leavetakings in the last couple of weeks--that is the melancholy part. I am surrounded here by boxes, slowly going through them and taking things out, setting up the rooms one by one. I did not leave myself much time to winnow things down before I left, so there are too many boxes filled with memorabilia and trinkets and papers, some of which are meaningful and some of which are not. I am focusing now on getting the essential things out and in place--such relief when I found the coffeemaker and then the screwdrivers!--but some of the other, sentimental things are mixed into the boxes. Opening up a box full of kitchen things just now I found, first, a tiny little white ceramic bud vase that says "I Love You" on it. My mother gave it to me as a thank-you present after I made a little dinner party for her and my father's 45th wedding anniversary, in January 1987. My mother was not here for much longer--she died in May 1988--and I have always cherished that little vase. I kissed it as I pulled it out of the box. The next item I pulled out and unwrapped turned out to be the memorial candle for my father, who died last October. I felt that little breeze of the uncanny--I thought, how could the movers possibly have known that these two things went together?

It is strange to be making this life change without my parents--especially my father, who was still here less than a year ago--getting to know about it. But I like to think they would be happy for me.




Leaving Brooklyn.





Here's the new place--I'm in the upstairs apartment.





I have wheels! A rental for now, but I will buy or lease a car before too long. Having fun with the novelty of being a driver.