When things fall apart. Again.

(LOL)

Since moving into my new place I’ve enjoyed lots of experiences that feel deeply reminiscent of my twenties: sleeping in late, eating trash and watching trash while lounging around in my underpants, lingering in a coffee shop on a Sunday morning with nowhere to be, staring off into the middle distance the day after a particularly good date. But turns out there is one specific experience I’ve discovered I don’t enjoy much at all:

Not knowing where the fuck I’m going to live next.

Wait, you might be thinking, I thought this dumb bitch just said she moved into her new place? Well, yes. And it’s already over. I’m moving back out and back home. The 2-year plan turned out to be more of a 2-1/2 week plan. Without getting into the details of what went down, there was a fundamental disagreement about one basic ground rule and it turned out to be a dealbreaker for both sides. Of course it’s best to find that out in the waning days of summer vs. in the dead of a Vermont winter and thousands of dollars later.

But still.

Fuck.

Something I’ve been wrestling with on and off for years — but especially this year — is did I waste too many years of my life, should we have gotten a divorce the normal way, if we did I’d have resolved all of this fucking shit by now, I wouldn’t be back to this seemingly endless holding pattern, et cetera, ad infinitum, pip pip!

But one phrase that friends told me over and over again, when things got real bad earlier this year, was “the journey is the journey.” Let me tell you something, I hated that phrase the first time I heard it, I hated it the tenth time I heard it, and I hate it again now that it’s back in my head. But it does help break the loop of pointless downer thoughts. Your life goes the way it goes and, most of the time, what can you do? It’s not like you can go back and change anything. Or, to put it in a way that’s attitudinally more in line with my sensibilities:

Whenever there’s been sudden chaos in my life, I immediately rush to create order. Often this is a good thing, a coping mechanism deployed to calm myself down that usually results in some unrelated benefits for others. Like the time I spent an entire weekend cleaning out and scrubbing down our fridge back in April while choke-sobbing. But sometimes in that rush toward order I don’t pause and step back to ask: Is this really what I want?

I immediately started to look at rental listings and as anyone around here knows, the whole rental/housing scene was a joke before, a joke since, a joke now, and will be a laff-laff-laffy god damn joke until forever. It’s just one big overpriced laff factory, full of scams and shit holes. I knew (and know) that the place I had secured and lost is as good as it’s likely to get. But I’m stuck.

Or … am I?

To be clear, even when I thought I was free and on my own I of course wasn’t really, not completely. Both in big-L Life ways and small-e-everyday bullshit ways. I am still legally married. My kids are still in school. I didn’t have sufficient wifi or cell reception at the cottage so I was driving back and forth to my family’s home to work every day in between calling Xfinity and going to the AT+T store. As a bonus, my dog was having a complete mental breakdown going between both places — she stopped eating, she followed me in and out of every room, she started panting the minute I had car keys in my hand. Which reminded me of this classic that applies to two of the three dogs I’ve owned:

Two out of those three dogs also looked/look exactly like this dog

I didn’t have time to do most of the things I said I would do in my previous newsletter (hey bud, the journey’s the journey, right? ⚔️). I decided to not take time off, or that much time anyway. I haven’t written anything but a handful of Instagram captions and this newsletter, nevermind the 50 pages of a novel I was supposed to write. I mean, I was moving. Then trouble shooting. Now I’ll be packing. Again. I want to say it’s all so dumb (and it is) but I’m also grateful for the experiences I did have. It was a beautiful space in a beautiful location and I’m relieved that I got to have some stellar moments and make some real memories, even in that brief window.

The last 2-1/2 weeks gave me my first glimpse into how different it felt to live in a space when you are alone long-term vs. “taking a week to get away”-alone. They are very different. They feel very different. Not better or worse, just very, very different. It also gave me my first glimpses into having a completely separate private life, to having weekend mornings to lounge around with someone new, to be able to make plans that aren’t just a window here and a window there before I scurry back home after a night out or take a few days away to be with someone. This is the worst part about losing the cottage, if I’m being completely honest. Well, that, and as I was reminded just this morning, being able to walk around naked. You know, it’s the little things. The little freedom things.

When I realized I had only one week left to stay, I decided to try to squeeze in as much as I could. I scheduled a couple dates. I had friends over. I didn’t get to do even a fraction of the things I had daydreamed about doing. Some of the friends who I had imagined would hang out there all the time didn’t even get to see it once. Although I think this whole situation is ultimately for the best, I’d be lying if didn’t say I’m feeling pretty bummed (and annoyed) currently.

I am both a person who believes in silver linings and also wants to punch silver linings in the face when anyone else brings up the existence of silver linings. But, blah, I guess they do exist here. One major one is I have been so thoroughly and completely checked out from my family’s life for the past 3-1/2 months and this turn of events is forcing me to check back in, immediately, thoroughly, and just in time.

I said I was going to have one of the best summers of my life and, holy shit, I really really really did. But with a little over two weeks to go before my kids return to school for their junior and senior years, the universe seems to be forcing me to get my Regular Life shit together. And, frankly, this was probably the only way that was going to happen in any sort of substantial, not-half-assing-it-as-I’ve-been-doing way.

So what’s next? I don’t know. One thing I’m considering is doing long-term what I had been doing short-term — switching up my time at our family home with stays at Airbnbs, traveling to see friends and family, and not looking for a long-term rental at all until I move out of Vermont for good. I can see how this path could get pretty old, of course, but given the rents I’m looking at, for places that truly blow, the thought that I could use this as an excuse to make real life connections (and reconnections) with people, continue to work remotely (which I was already doing a decade pre-pandemic), and also get some regular space and time to refocus on my writing sounds like a pretty enchanting course of action right now. And it’d likely cost the same or much less.

But, that’s for me to think about later. For now, I’ll be spending the next couple of days packing up again. Putting books in boxes. Dragging back the one bookshelf and one piece of art I had specifically bought for the cottage. Dumping my toiletries and clothes and sheets into big L.L. Bean tote bags and giant crinkly IKEA bags and carting them back home. Then I’ll spend a few days floating in our cheap ass pool at home until I crank up the organizational machine and try to figure my life out. Again. (LOL)

In the meantime, if you’re in Vermont (or, really, anywhere in New England) and have or know of: a great and not outrageously expensive Airbnb, VRBO, a guest house, 2nd home, and/or a cottage (maybe you own it but don’t use it, maybe you just know of it, etc. and so on), WITH STRONG-ASS WIFI and that’s available for a week, two weeks, or a month at a time, please do reach out. This might turn into the most roving and long-term writer residency of my life.

P.S. If you were wondering if sifting through photos of the last couple of weeks at least made me feel a little bit better the answer is … no 😌

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THINGS FROM ELSEWHERE
• If you haven’t seen this already, this is an absolute must-watch. I love Cindy Gallop. But holy hell, what really stood out to me about this conversation was how no-bullshit, no-caveating, no-tip-toe-ing, no-making-it-ok-for-others it is. I think I (and so many older women) endlessly talk around these issues, not realizing how much we are still actively absorbing and accommodating patriarchal views of aging, marriage, having kids, wanting sex, and, hello, she did part of this interview in her underwear at the age of 61. “Cindy Gallop Is Not A Relationship Person And Cannot WAIT To Die Alone”
• I’ll admit I really am so over toddler humor (because I really am so over toddlers!) but this genuinely made me laugh. The ACCURACY. “Things you’ll never hear a three-year-old say” by Olivia Appleby on McSweeney’s.
• I am contractually obligated to mention The Bear in all my communications, so here is a story I found interesting and enjoyable although it isn’t (completely) focused on Carmy’s arms: “‘The Bear’ is the breakout TV series of summer, thanks to its supporting cast” from WBEZ Chicago.
• I loved this piece from just about every angle. From the writer’s (daughter’s) perspective, from the mother’s perspective, as well as how much it made me think of my Grandma Arrow and how being social was such a defining aspect of her life and her happiness. “My Mom Has No Friends” by Monica Corcoran Harel on The Cut.
• Absolutely incredible images in “A Woman’s Intimate Record of Wyoming in the Early Twentieth Century” from The New Yorker.
• Really more of a laugh/cry situation: “A reimagining of your uterus, which I, Elon Musk, now own” by Miriam Jayaratna and Alexa Kocinski on McSweeney’s.
• This piece made me feel very very very nostalgic about all the work friends I’ve made over the years, but especially those first ones. “The Magic of Your First Work Friends” by Emma Goldberg in The New York Times. “There’s an electricity to forming that first close friend at work. It’s the thrill of staying too late at drinks to keep giggling. It’s the delight of darting to someone’s desk and dragging her to the bathroom to gossip. It’s the tenderness of showing up to work on a rough morning and realizing a co-worker will know instantly that something is wrong.”

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You can find my books here. You can find my writing here. You can find my copywriting and creative direction work here. You can find me on Twitter. You can find me on Instagram. Good effing luck finding me in real life! I can’t even find me!