I've spent a few nights in my shed, both in the bitter cold and sweltering heat. I've swept the floor and packed things into available nooks. I've sat and listened to the silence, and peered out the little window into the blackness as I imagine someone creepily looking back. Today, though, today I felt like I actually started to clean and put together my home.
I don't know that it's ever taken me so long to get something. Lack of time, knowledge, money, or even luck have made every single inch of having a place to live paint a ridiculous picture. It involves every angle from the shit gotten into with previous roommates, to the terrible place it looks like I'm at in my judgment and capacity to plan while couch-sleeping. “Isn't he a grown man? Why do you keep helping him,” my friend's mom said in her suggestion he shouldn't sell me his car. There's no benefit of the doubt or good will when you slip or need help, at least, it might go as far as it can throw you.
But that's the thing too, I've shown I'm willing to sleep in my car. I've never not been able to afford rent for a room. In, mostly an act of spite, I paid the difference between what I was saving by not having a room, because the idea of being viewed as unequal or inadequate I refuse to stand for. You see, it's only reasonable for the smaller room, let alone no room, to pay less for other people, not really for someone like me. I always owe a little more, don't I?
It's been changing forever, but today is the first day it happened. I drove straight home, figured out what little I could do to refine my space, and just proceeded to do so. The heat works. The lights turn on. It's unlikely there will be a parade of muddy boots across the floor. Now, I have my mildly disheveled day-2 dorm room, and I'm certain somewhere in me is a weeping little child. I saw myself playing my instruments. I saw myself building a tri-lofted couch/bed combo. I saw myself opening my big garage door into an in-process carport-eventual-studio space. I saw myself being left alone to finally just do and just be.
And I've got so much else I want to do. Greenhouse experiments, a pool, and a deck are all on relatively short order. I need to raise the house again and put it on permanent concrete columns given the precariousness of so much water and mud affecting the blocks. I need to drain/build the driveway. I need to build the canopy so I can work in the rain. I need outside lights, a fence, and to hook up my security cameras after figuring out why the wifi/router isn't working. I need to do a dozen tiny things that I'll be able to do 5-6 hours at a time after work (thus taking my mind completely off work) every day, all weekend, and to my heart's content. I can design the layout freely, paint with whatever colors, and just be free to fuck things up in my own time and at my own pace.
Dear god, I actually started organizing my space. I was tempted to say “forever space,” as an homage to an incredibly stupid saying people use about their partners. You know, their “forever human” who's their “best friend.” Gag me. My best friend will be the silence I fill with struggling to learn new instruments and songs. It'll be the noise of my obnoxious treadmill or power tools. I'll occupy the “now” space again. No, not next month weather providing. Tonight. No, not when we find the extra hands. This weekend, one way or another, this is where I am, here's the task, I'll proceed to do the task. It sounds like I'm overselling it at this point. There is no greater joy than getting out of this sit and wait bullshit nonsense period of my life. I can't wait to start falling so behind on so much TV. I almost stayed the night just to prove a point about what I could manage with the bottles of water I left out there.
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