the sun also sets on westview terrace

i felt, standing on the steps coming down from the third floor of westview for the last time, like i should have had some moment of coruscating emotion. some jarring instant where all the oddities and contradictions and loose threads from the last three years of my life suddenly fused into the existential equivalent of a vintage 70s cable-knit sweater and bruce hornsby's "mandolin rain" just started blaring from the sky itself as everything slid into place.

but it wasn't that.

instead, i was a little hot from standing in the sun, a little groggy from having just woken up and driven to the front office only to be told (in contradiction to the instructions given to me the previous night) to meet the person doing my final "walkthrough" at westview itself. and a little nervous, not because i thought the apartment was in bad shape, but because i thought the girl doing the checkout was really cute in a really dorky, large-glasses sort of way and i hadn't combed my hair in three days.

that was all.

i originally moved into westview with the idea (admittedly halfhearted, but still earnest) of someday soon marrying the girl i had moved there with, with the idea of getting my MA and then getting a job writing somewhere, somehow. with the idea that all i needed were those two things and everything else would make sense.

coming back out three years later, that particular me seems so foreign my brain sort of balks at the idea that it was only that long ago. that so much could have happened in so little time. of what three or four moments over almost a thousand days can turn all the other moments into. fate seems to have a lot in common with chemistry. boring thing A plus boring thing B = BOOM, and suddenly your beard is gone and your eyes are cartoon X's and you're saying "wait...what?"

anyway, it's nice to be moving on, even if it's terrifying to know that i have no idea what i'm really moving on to. it's terrifying to know that i'm probably moving farther away from the few things i'm pretty sure i actually want. but versus staying where i was, it makes sense. mostly.

this apartment is awesome, aside from everything else. i'm still waiting to get a reliable internet connection (thanks, road runner!) but as soon as i do...pictures, pictures.

i still have lots of pictures from the last few weeks in kent...unfortunately, a pretty huge amount of them feature me not wearing a shirt and shambling around drunkenly. you don't want to see that. even those of you who might think you do...i appreciate the sentiment. but you're wrong.