ORDER FORM | HOME PAGE
 |
Shepherd Hoodwin |
I moved!
MY NEW ADDRESS: 99 Pearl Laguna Niguel CA 92677-4818 • 949-429-8792
It's a bit of a tradition that I write an account of my moves. I entitled the last one, in 1996, "The Journey of My Body." I'm calling this one "A Moving Story." I wrote four installments over the past couple months that I shared with members of my email Forwards list. This is a revised version of them recapping the story.
At the end of October, my landlord gave me notice that I needed to leave my oceanfront condo, where I lived for nine years, because his family was moving back into it. I hoped for a miracle that would allow me to stay at the beach, where prices have skyrocketed, and scoured the local listings.
I also looked into becoming an expatriate in the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America, or Australia, possibly as a caretaker, so I could continue to live on the ocean and have warmer weather, but that sounded lonely. I considered moving to North Las Vegas where I'm buying an investment house (too brown). I flew up to Chico in northern California to explore moving into a co-housing community (which is fabulous, but I discovered that Chico has winter, as well as 110-degree summers). I kept feeling sad at the thought of leaving this area.
I broadened my local search to include the more affordable nearby communities. I applied for a lovely place in Laguna Niguel, about fifteen minutes inland from where I was living. In the meantime, I continued to look at several places in Laguna Beach. I finally got to see a tiny, expensive oceanfront apartment (one of the few advertised) about which I'd had high hopes. It was at the bottom of someone's house. When I discovered that it was a dump, I was ready to take the Laguna Niguel place. When I got home, I found that the realtor had called fifteen minutes earlier, about the time I had made my decision, to tell me that I had been chosen for it. I took that as a sign. It's about a third smaller than my previous home, but it has cathedral ceilings and skylights, so it feels spacious. I was delighted that most of my furniture and art fit. It has wood floors, my favorite (and rare around here), and a wood- and gas-burning fireplace, which I love. It's at the back of a condo complex that abuts a greenbelt where I can take walks if I don't want to drive to the beach. The trail overlooks I-5 in the distance, but it's still pretty nice. The unit has interesting irregularly shaped rooms, so it's not boxy. Before I found this place, I spent six weeks sorting through everything I owned, thoroughly cleaning as I went. I held a "free garage sale in my living room" and many friends came and took things. I got rid of two-thirds of my books and clothes, and threw away most of the paper in my office. I experienced a sense of accomplishment and flow--the things I needed seemed to come to hand at the right time. Still, I never worked so physically hard in my life, virtually every waking hour for two months now. At one point, the Chinese owner of the liquor store where I went to get boxes looked at me incredulously and asked, "You STILL moving?"
The move itself, which was supposed to be done in one day, stretched out over six, with the usual sundry disasters, clashes, and additional costs. I was relieved to be finally done there so I could focus on the new place. Unpacking, organizing, and decorating were creative and enjoyable. I'm now looking forward to having some down time.
Moving is said to be one of the five most stressful things in life, along with the death of a loved one, bankruptcy, divorce, and Republicans. Considering this, I think I stayed pretty relaxed (I imagine it would have been much tougher while working a 9-5 job). However, during the move, it seemed like everyone else was at each others' throats, and I was constantly trying to smooth things out. It's clear why we don't have peace on earth and goodwill toward men. Here's a koan for humanity: Why is everyone else always wrong?
In dealing with stress, I'm a big believer in laughter as an alternative to a padded cell or a case of Stoli. (I admit to downing two quarts of Soy Cream Very Cherry Chip in a relatively short period of time during the move, but that was because there wasn't anything else to eat. And with the bowls still packed, I had to eat it directly from the carton--it was impossible not to finish it since I was in an easy chair and couldn't get up. Add to that the fact that children are starving in Africa and you can clearly see that it wasn't my fault.) Unfortunately, "The Journey of My Body" was funnier than this current account, because that move was more horrendous. However, I'm pleased to report that this one was horrendous enough to still provide an adequate amount of humor for all normal purposes.
Some things haven't changed since 1996. I'm still appalled, for example, at the U.S.'s lax crash-testing standards for dressers, and I doubt that this Administration will get anything done on this issue, seeing as how they're in bed with the furniture manufacturers. Contrast that to the high standards for Italian leather sofas. The big mystery of this move was whether the couch would fit through the front door of the new place. It didn't at the old place. (I guess that in Italy, they make the couches first, then build the houses around them.) Those of you who read "The Journey of My Body" may recall the exciting but near-fatal Sofa Toss, in which it was hoisted from the floor below over the terrace railing through the sliding glass doors. During this move, the Toss needed to be repeated, only down this time, which looked to be even more exciting. (We considered using bungee cords to spice things up further.) The new place doesn't have any sliding glass doors, so if the coach didn't fit, I planned on putting it in the carport, adding a much-needed homey touch, until selling it.
This year's Toss turned out to be a smashing success. In addition to being passed over the terrace railing to the floor below at my old place, it was pushed up a story over more railings (to avoid outside stairs with too little clearance) at the new place, and in through the front picture window (brilliant!)--it was open, by the way--with nary a scratch and quicker than you can say "Uh-oh, Spaghetti-o's" ten thousand times. If not quite poetry, it was prose in motion. Unfortunately, things were not so smooth for the marble-top coffee table, perhaps because it isn't Italian. However, there's always a silver lining: the top was very heavy; in five pieces, it's now much easier to transport.
In disassembling my AV and computer set-ups, I was amazed at the endless coaxial cables, phone cords, adaptors, and other sundry connectors tangled in a dusty Dr. Seuss-like maze. There were a lot of jury-rigged patches that had been added over the years, and I knew it could be done more simply, but I figured that it would take Divine or Cable Company Intervention to get it all working again in my new place.
However, I realized--and I don't mean to brag--that being a very old soul such myself, I've had a LOT of past lives working in consumer electronics, and I knew that if I could go into a deep enough trance, I could access my inner knowledge. In fact, in one lifetime, I was a cable installer. Back in those days, we used jute instead of coaxial, but I don't think that things have otherwise changed that much. I'm pleased to report that, despite my trepidation, I got the AV set-up working fine with the aid of some medicinal substances, and was able to eliminate a lot of extraneous cords (I got it down to 1137). There was only one AC adaptor I couldn't identify, and since there were none missing, I figure it must have been purely decorative. I did run into one hitch that took me a while to figure out: what to do with the RF Defibrillator that the cable company had told me I needed and was somehow hooked up last time. It turns out that it was unnecessary, apparently another example of cable company conspicuous consumption, along with their 740 channels. They must have thought that since everyone else has an RF Defibrillator, I should have one, too.
I got my internet access up and running relatively easily (it was the first thing I set up in the new place), with only four customer-service erased emails, three service outages, two password changes, and a cable chewed in half by a partridge in a pear tree.
I spent a lot of time in hardware stores hunting down parts for repairs as well as things like hooks and sliders. One is reminded in such times that little things mean a lot: without a tiny cross-dowel nut that fell out en route, the futon couldn't be assembled. Since no one had the right one, I had to come up with a work-around, which took several trips to the stores. One clerk told me that manufacturers deliberately use non-standard parts to increase their profits when people have to come to them, and often replace whole units and not just the part. How much time and frustration has this short-sighted and ungenerous thinking cost the world? The huge number of different kinds of, say, screws at Home Depot (not to mention those they don't carry) suggests a need for some international standards, reducing the variety down to the essentials--this would increase efficiency a great deal. The screw industry could use the motto, "Less screws, more screwing!"
I mentioned that I researched living in the Caribbean, which has my favorite weather and beaches. This condo complex is called Crystal Cay, after an island in the Bahamas, and all the little streets, such as Grenada and Martinique, have Caribbean names. I live on Pearl; Pearl Islands are off Panama, which is perhaps the hottest current American expatriate destination. (I would have preferred Diamond, or, at least, Emerald, but I'm told that pearls are a symbol of chastity, so, unfortunately, it's appropriate.) This may not actually be the Caribbean, but, then, how many Caribbean islands have a Trader Joe's?
Incidentally, when a friend moved, he labeled a box of wedding silver as "Silver," and it never arrived--the movers stole it! So I labeled all my boxes "Crap" and "More Crap."
I think I'm going to be quite comfortable here. I did have a panic attack when I woke up the other morning and looked out the window. "The ocean! What did they do with the ocean?!" However, there are some pluses here, too. For example, in my old place, the bedrooms faced Coast Highway and had frosted windows. Here, from the bedrooms, there's a lovely view of a verdant hillside, eucalyptus trees, a parking lot, and a dumpster.
I've learned many lessons from this experience, which is, of course, what it's all about. The main one is that if I ever again go looking for my heart's desire and can't find it in my own back yard, it may be because I don't have a back yard--I live in a condo. Still, there's no place like home, wherever that is.
(NEED TO INSERT NUMBER AFTER 58 IN NEW PAGES FOR LINKEXCHANGE)