Back online...for now

I arrived safely in Michigan a couple of hours ago. I'm here until the 30th (Lord help us all), although it's really more the 29th since I leave at, oh, 8 am on the 30th. The untrusting bastards in my new apartment building all have their wireless accounts password protected, so I haven't been able to get online from home and all "blogging" sites are blocked on my work computer. Therefore, I'll be able to check in with y'all for the next 10 days or so.

The move went smoothly. It came down to the wire, but everything fell into place the day before the move. I was able to do it without springing for a moving truck--my new place was just a few miles from the old one, and I had friends moving carloads of boxes. Sadly, moving my furniture was only a few trips in the back of a Ford truck (although the guys did fit quite a lot into each of those trips, with their Tetris-like loading skillz). It only took a few hours (with a U-Haul, it would have been like 20 minutes, but whatever).

I really like my new place. I have brand new carpet and of course the walls were freshly painted, so that's cool. My favorite part of the apartment is over by the bedroom and bathroom. The bathroom has two doors--one leading out to the main part of the apartment and then one leading to the bedroom. On the way to the bedroom, though, is a little hallway with 2 huge closets on each side, giving it almost a walk-in-closet feel. It's got lots of storage and closets for a one bedroom, too, which is nice. My dining room area is obviously totally empty except for a bookcase, and my living room consists of my small couch, a tv stand and the TV, but overall it's starting to look like a (sparsely furnished) home. I'm kind of looking forward to slowly adding new pieces of furniture over the next few months. I bet I can make some really good garage sale finds. And it's MINE. No roommate. Oh, the giddiness of it all.

Everything else is fine. The kids were nuts this last week and about killed me, but now I'm freeeee till the 4th. I've been seeing a lot of Chad, of course (since I have my OWN DAMN PLACE and can do whatever I want), but we're still more friends than anything. Sort of. It's quite complicated. We care about each other in a more-than-friends way, but we also don't want to screw up our really close friendship. So we're kind of seeing what happens. I've been having so much fun with him, though. It's like having your best friend sleep over a lot (even on a school night, LOL). And for the record, he sleeps out on the couch when he's there. He says it's more comfortable than my bed. (Sometimes he'll lay in there with me, talking with me till I fall asleep, then he moves out to the living room.)

All in all, life is pretty good. Thanks for all the thoughts and prayers. They obviously worked. I'm off to get my Facebook fix now (another site that's blocked from work). What's everyone else been up to?

SO. STRESSED.

Theoretically, I'm moving in a day and a half. I still don't know what my final deposit is going to be, and once I find out I have to run to the bank to get a cashier's check or money order....oh, and I still have to arrange to have the power turned on (so it better be able to be done same-or next-day)...all of this by Saturday. Yeah. A little stressed.

On the plus side, I'm pretty much packed.

I won't have internet hooked up right away, so worst case scenario, I won't be back online (as in the blog and Facebook; I can still check email from work) till next weekend, when I get to my mom's house. However, there's a good chance that someone in my new building will have wireless that my laptop can piggyback off (for free. Holla!) so you may be seeing me sooner.

Pray for me!

Update on the update

Okay. So I'm good to go in my new apartment; we're still haggling over my down payment/deposit (they don't want to "lose me" and I'm "exploring other options," LOL. Initially, they were anticipating an extra $250 or so for a deposit, but then the lady I talked to today said I may need a month's depsoit (roughly $600), which obviously is a major difference. At this point, my rental and employment history are my two ace in the holes. #1, I've had the same steady job for 4 years and #2, my rental history is great. I have a male friend stepping in for Brad, since his phone is disconnected and I need a reference for the last 2 years. At this point, they acknowledge that my credit sucks ass but that my rental history appears literally flawless, and that's the only thing going for me....so although we can't get a hold of Brad physically, I just have someone to testify on his behalf that Jen paid faithfully and on time every month for two years. Is it shady? Not really. It's not like I was a faulty tenant and I'm having someone lie for me. I'm having someone tell the truth, just in place of the actual "landlord." Hey, screw you all. I have 5 days to find a place to live. ;)

So...I'm good to go, almost definitely. Like I said, all we're debating on is my deposit. I was hoping to get out of here by Wednesday, but it looks like I'll need till Saturday. Maybe it's better. Moving mid-week WOULD be tough. Things here at the homefront are civil, considering. I'm playing nice. Internally, I'm just counting down the days, and when I'm home, I'm staying in my room. The weekend was harder because we were both off of work both days, but I was out with friends of mine, so that helped. And on Sunday, I slept in (ridiculously late) and packed. I'm really doing well on packing; I mostly have left my clothes in the dressers and then some things in the kitchen. I was going to take a day off this week to help with the packing and moving, but now I may not need to, if I can handle it all on Saturday (and I'm sure she'd allow me Sunday to get some more miscellaneous things. Like I said, we're on decent terms as of right now).

I think that's about all for now. I'm hanging in there, considering.

A "slight" update

So....to make a very long story short, my roommate and I have had a falling out, and I have 2 weeks to move out (not even. More like 12 days).

Everything was going perfectly, literally perfectly, till very recently. She disapproves of Chad, basically. What I hadn't told you guys yet, because I didn't even know myself what was going to come of this whole thing, is that he got out of jail about 2 months ago for drugs (dealing). He told me everything the night we met, because he said I deserved to know everything about him and his background so I could decide if I even wanted to keep talking to him that night or just walk away. The way I was raised, and the way I am as a person, is that it's not my job to judge others. I've made some mistakes in my past that *I* would not like to be judged by/for/on, and it's not my place to judge him or his "value." If nothing else, he needs a friend right now. Every single action of his so far has shown me that he truly does want to turn his life around--that he made an incredible mistake that almost ruined his life for good, and he intends to do everything he can to take advantage of the opportunity he has now. In fact, he wants to return to school to become a drug and alcohol counselor, so he can use his past experiences to help others (although right now, he's just trying to find a job; as we all know, it's a tough job market out there for anyone at the moment, let alone someone with his past).

And yes, we really are just friends, for the record. We've talked about "us" quite a bit already, and although we've become really close in the last month or so and have spent a LOT of time together, we also know that jumping into a relationship is not great for either of us. He knows I need time to get to know him and see if he is serious about making a change--and on his end, he's trying to pick up the pieces of his life, so adding a relationship to that is obviously the least of his concerns. To paraphrase what he told me, he feels like absolute shit about himself right now and as though he has absolutely nothing to bring to the table right now, in terms of an equal partnership/relationship....kind of the whole "you have to love yourself to truly love someone else" thing. And he said that this could very well be the start of something; but right now, he has to start rebuilding his life. However, he also tells me on a daily basis that he's so grateful he met me, that it means the world to him that I DO listen to him without judgement, and allow him to vent and figure things out, sometimes in his OWN head, and that I believe he can be successful. He also said that my friends and I (he's met many of them at this point) are exactly the kind of people he needs to surround himself with right now as he builds his new life.

Soooo....I made the mistake (in hindsight) of telling April about his past. I honestly thought that she'd keep an open mind as well (even if she wasn't thrilled with his past cuz let's face it, who would be? *I* don't love it myself). However, she told me on Sunday evening that he is not welcome in our apartment at all, for any length of time, period, which led to an argument. I called her judgemental and she called me naive. I said it was people like her who made it impossible for people like him TO change his life around, and that it must be nice to have lived a life that's free of any kind of mistakes and regrets. I pointed out that she'd barely ever spoken a word to him (not just when he was here, which frankly wasn't that often anyway, but when we'd be out with friends or whatever as well) or made any true attempt to get to know him, and she replied that she already knew everything she needed/wanted to know about him.

That was Sunday. I told her I thought she was overreacting by banning him from the apartment completely but if that's what she wanted, so be it, at which point I took off to go talk to him and cool off. (For the record, the argument we had definitely involved raised voices on both sides, but I actually thought I did a pretty damn good job at keeping it adult and civil.) By the time I got back later that night, she was in bed, and then I was in bed by the time she returned last night. We exchanged a couple of texts, primarily about the dog (had she been out recently, etc--I also told her that although I did care about Chad, I also didn't want this to jeopardize either our friendship or our living situation) but that was it.

Then tonight, she came home around 8:00 (with a friend of hers, another teacher at our school by the way). She knocked on my door; I thought she was coming in for a nice little heart to heart and instead she said that she felt it was best that I leave, and that I had 12 days in which to do it (for the record, her name is the only one on the lease because my credit kinda sucks, but we got this place together and it was "ours"). Her reasoning is that her parents are "horrified" that I'm living here, exposing her to "those kinds of people" and "putting her in danger". I pointed out that I'd agreed not to bring him here anymore so the entire point/discussion seemed moot to me, and she said yes, but she knows I'm still hanging out with him, and she doesn't want to live with someone who allow people like that into their life. But mostly it's her parents, it seems. They dont want their daughter living with someone who associates with people like that (aka flawed) and now they "fear for her safety" (although he doesn't have anything violent in his background or on his record, period).

So...there you have it. I have until we leave for Christmas break in 12 days to get packed and moved. To say I'm in shock doesn't even begin to cover how I feel right now. I mean, if he was an actual drug dealer STILL, and I was running around slinging hash with him and joining him in drive-bys when I wasn't busy shooting up, that's one thing. But I certainly don't think that he's a bad person today because of what happened in his past (a red flag? Sure. Something to watch very carefully? Absolutely. But does it mean that he's not worth getting to know or that he CAN'T make something out of his life? Absolutely NOT). And I CERTAINLY certainly don't think that I'M a bad person because of it.

This all just went down tonight and I'm really shell-shocked....but you know, she isn't the kind of person that *I* thought she was and she's not someone I want to live with, let alone be friends with. It sucks that I only have 12 days but frankly, I don't want to be here anymore anyway. Most of the people who HAVE met him actually like him and, again, are keeping an open mind, which is all I ever wanted from her. But if she's this quick to judge people (not just him but, let's face it, she's judging ME as well now, and that I'm no longer worth having as a friend OR a roommate)--well, that's not the kind of person I want in MY life. You know what? I would much rather be TOO trusting and naive and caring than be that judgemental of others, even if it means my getting hurt (which I have in the past and I'm sure I will again) because of that trust.

So....there you go. I really didn't even want to tell you guys about this (his past), if only because I wanted you to know him for who he is today and who he desperately wants to be in the future, rather than who he was. I KNOW there's the chance that he will go back to that lifestyle, and HE knows that that's something I would not be able to stand by or stick around for....and I really think I would know if he did start it up again because quite frankly, he was not selling a little pot on the side before. He had a pretty major business going, and if he gets a job as a server, let's say, he'd have a really hard time hiding or explaining a sudden, dramatic increase in the his income...not to mention the fact that he's been nothing but up front with me so far. Trust me on this, he even tells me when he has the CHANCE to do something but turns it down. Now that he's been out for a while, some of his old contacts are starting to call, asking if he can get this or that, and he keeps saying no. And guys, I would never ever ever justify that kind of behavior but right now, he has NOTHING. And it takes a lot of balls to say no to a single phone call that could bring in hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars when you are so down and out. And he's DOING it. And I actually admire that kind of strength and determination. And as long as he's trying to turn it around, I'm perfectly willing to be a friend to him while he does. And if it becomes more than that, we'll see.

And yes, I KNOW I can get hurt here. But I am who I am, and I'm not sorry for that. I have a big heart (if not a big brain, ha ha), and I care about people, and I can see the good in them. Yes, I DO still believe that most people, at their core, are good, and I will always believe that, even when it does bite me in the ass (and even if others can't or won't see that good in them). I've lived too flawed a life to even think about judging others, and that's one of the things that I think my friends--my TRUE friends--value about me the most...that I will always listen with an open mind and never judge them, their decisions or their actions.

Because that's just how I roll.