The psychological weight of items
I moved. It was so stressful. Every time I move I feel as though I must recon with the psychological weight of every item that I own. Why do I own anything? I ask myself, as I sort through my trinkets and various worn pieces of gear, trying to decide what to get rid of, what needs to be purged and what, if donated, I’ll just end up missing later, and then have to buy a second time. Sifting through a year’s worth of photo prints that I’ve let pile up in a drawer is like walking backwards through time, reliving every dreamy high and crushing disappointment of the past twelve months. Emotions I thought I’d already processed come up like disturbed sediment in a pond and I must process them again, but quickly now, because I’m trying to pack! This purging is ultimately good for me, and I should probably do it anyway, but I’ve never had to try and schedule it in because for my entire life I’ve moved constantly. I don’t want to move anymore, though. I want to be the sort of person who lets things pile up a little longer. I liked the place I was living, and I was hoping not to have to move for a long time. I’ve always been a really good tenant- I’ve never been late with rent and bills, I’m clean and quiet, my dogs don’t destroy shit. I’ve rented my entire life and I’ve never had a problem with a landlord, not ever. I’m still reeling from this whole situation.
On the second-to-last night in my house, in the midst of packing, the northern lights came out in Anchorage in a way that never happens. Everyone was texting each other- go look outside! I stood in the street, shivering because it was like one degree and I was wearing my pajamas, and cried as the sheets of green rippled and shimmered above me, seemingly everywhere and nowhere all at once. I’ve only seen the northern lights a few times, but every time it feels like I’m basically touching god, “god” being the concept in quantum entanglement of every particle communicating with every other particle in existence, instantly. It felt like a fitting and beautiful end to my emotional purge, like the universe was rewarding me for excellent distress tolerance. The universe was rewarding everyone in Alaska that night. A little shimmering display of magic. As a treat.
After I was all packed up my friends helped me move, which is awesome, because loading a uhaul in the middle of winter, when it’s ten degrees outside and the ground is a sheet of ice and snow is actively falling is actually quite tricky. None of us slipped and fell though, and my stuff fit nicely in my storage unit, and now I’m settled into my friend’s spare room that I’m renting until June, when a longer term situation opens up. The housing market in Anchorage right now is, I’d be willing to bet, one of the worst in the country, and if the city doesn’t create some regulations around rent prices and vacation rentals really soon, everyone but the wealthy will have to leave, and then the wealthy won’t have any goods or services and they’ll have to leave too, and this city will be a ghost town. Which honestly would be a funny way to go. City Raises Rents So High It Kills Itself Off, Is Ghost Town Now. That future is kind of fun to try and imagine. The only building left occupied will be a single hotel downtown, where a skeleton crew of people will live off of moose and salmon. They’ll have a dog team, since there’s no way to get gasoline anymore, and they’ll have solar panels for electricity and woodstoves for heat. Honestly, sign me up.
In other news, I sent my speculative fiction novel out to some very generous beta readers and the feedback I’m getting is so useful and good. I’ve never had beta readers before, and it’s honestly gonna make this book way better than it would’ve been otherwise. Also, did I tell you that writing fiction is making me fall in love with writing in a whole new way? I mean, I’ve always liked to write but I honestly never thought it could be this fun. Building a whole-ass world from scratch fills me with such childlike wonder. I’ll start thinking about my characters and get completely lost in a sort of dreamland, imagining what they’ll say and do, where they’ll go and what might happen to them, what their hopes and dreams and fears are. I’ll forget where I am or what I’m supposed to be doing. It’s a total break from this reality. It makes me feel like a kid again. It makes me feel like I’m on mushrooms. I dunno.
Also, it won’t stop snowing in Anchorage. It usually snows a lot here, but this year, like so many places, it’s extra snowy. Piles and piles of fluffy white stuff that won’t stop coming. What an interesting time to be alive.
Ok bye!
-Carrot