I’m here. I’m settling. I’m still collecting my thoughts on California, but in the meantime I wanted to tell you about the other time I moved across the country from Massachusetts to Austin. Otherwise known as the time Tim and I set my car on fire. Every time Tim and I made a significant move, we rented a big U-Haul truck. We’d tetris all of our wordly belongings into the back in some precarious kind of way, and Tim would drive…
I made it to Riverside. Even though I had a temper tantrum somewhere in Arizona, the journey went really well. No blown tires. No giant mishaps. No overheated engines. Couldn’t ask for better. Moving with the dogs though, is a bit of an adventure. See, my dogs reflect the two opposing sides of my personality. Eliot is the wounded poet. He has a lot of feelings. As a deeply emotional dog who hates change, the hardest part of moving for him…
When I was in high school, I said “Howdy” a lot. I used it as my default AOL instant messenger greeting (these were pre-texting days). I wrote it on my notebook. Howdy was part of a horse lover, upbeat, awkward identity my adolescent self was struggling to find. Because of my howdy’s, my friends would joke with me that I belonged in Texas. Back then, fourteen-year-old Lauren would never have guessed that she’d end up living in the Lone Star state…
If it seems like all I’ve been talking about on the blog lately is moving, that’s because all I’ve been doing in real life is moving. Well, that and going out with my friends as much as possible which makes for interesting-but-not-exactly-for-this-blog content. While Saturday I spent the entire day hungover and unable to move resting, yesterday I was as productive as can be trying to pack up the last bits of my house. It made me think of some…
Home ownership being single has been a lot different than it was with him. For our first house, we took what one might call a lackadaisical approach. All of the paperwork, insurance and mortgage business was up to him and I just assumed things got done properly. Sometimes it did, and sometimes it didn’t. Lawn care was up to me, but I tended to focus on little projects versus the big picture. About once a quarter, I’d get inspired and…
The question I’ve been asked the most frequently since I announced my school plans i — Are you excited??? Yes, super excited. Even more so now that I have my house leased out and a place to live once I get there. In fact, I might even be more excited than I am terrified at this point, which is a huge improvement to a month ago. The second most popular question has undoubtedly been — Are you changing your blog name? I’m…
Earlier this week, I posted a kind of gloom & doom post outlining my anxieties about my upcoming move. As I hope you knew, those aren’t my only feelings. Today I’ll share a much happier posts – the things I’m stoked about! I Get to Focus on Writing More Than Anything Else. Writing has always been important to me, but it’s never been allowed to be the star of my life. Even in undergrad, creative writing was my minor so…
Alternate titles to this post include: Say Hello to Lauren’s Anxiety! Holding Readers Captive While I Panic About My Life Choices Join Me on a Compelling Journey of Pre-Move Jitters Mostly, I’m excited to quit my job, start school and move halfway across the country on my own… mostly. Still, this is a huge life change that’s happening in a month and a half. Though I’ve done huge moves before (NC to MA, MA to TX), I always had Tim with…