as i mentioned before, i live in a tree house, 142 stairs from the street to my front door. not surprisingly, UPS doesn’t deliver up here. neither does the pizza guy or the mail man. garbage and recycling must be packed down the hill to the cans at the bottom. moving men must be bribed with large cash tips. late night thai food must be sought out on foot.
on the other hand, i can see all the way to san francisco from my front porch. there are trees on every side of my ramshackle little house, blackberries growing out back, and baby deer in the front yard most mornings and again at twilight. spiders consider my house a modest inconvenience on their route from one side of the forest to the other, and make frequent appearances, but i am slowly adapting.
the thing about living alone is that there is the same answer to every “who used up all the….” question. who didn’t change the toilet paper roll? oh, right. who used up all the butter? ate all the cookies? forgot to wash the dishes again for three days in a row? ah, yes. me. i frequently quiz the cat as to why he hasn’t done the dishes when he’s home all day long and i’m at work earning us both a living, but he seems to feel no guilt. the upside to living alone in a tree house is that i can crank music up at any hour and make coffee in my underwear if i want to. i confess, internets, that i’m excited about finally getting a DDR game – no downstairs neighbors to torture with my awkward dancing and stomping.
it’s lonely, some nights, coming home to no one but the cat. chicago exists out there, 2 hours’ time difference but still only a phone call away. the light on the city fades while i make dinner, then a few hours of sleep, and miles to run in the morning. the trail running here is breath-taking. i don’t even have to drive to a trailhead; it’s right outside my front door. i wake to fog most mornings, but as i run up the side of mount tam, i run above to fog level and into the sunshine.
outside of marathon training, my job is taking everything i’ve got, so there hasn’t been a lot of energy left over for building up a new social life. it’ll come, in time, and i knew this first year was going to be like this. i’m doing good work. i believe in it. every day is a series of victories and insurmountable challenges that, the next day, i somehow figure out how to handle and move on to the next one. there’s some serious character building going on here.
but if i haven’t returned your call, or your email, or fb message, just know that i don’t have much left over at the end of the day right now. but your love is much appreciated, and much needed.