I’m sitting on the carpet, legs crossed, slicing open the tape on a package of dinnerware.
Beside me are two outdoor folding chairs— set up on the floor of the mostly bare living room— and a pile of cardboard boxes.
It’s dark out and the sound of the dishwasher splashing behind me breaks the quiet with a steady thurm.
A half hour or so earlier, I had started awake, flat on my stomach on the carpet, having fallen asleep watching YouTube videos on my laptop, worn out from a long weekend of driving and hauling bags, bundles, and still more boxes up the staircase… and into my new apartment.
A little more than a week ago, I signed a lease for the first time. Moving out from my parent’s place brought the realization that in the entirety of my boyfriend and I’s earthly possessions, there were exactly zero plates, zero bowls, and zero cooking utensils.
We had a Ninja air fryer and an Instant Pot—and practically nothing else.
I rapidly set out to remedy this situation.
Now—several Amazon orders and store trips later—I am well on my way toward cooking in comfort.
Our washer and dryer are likely being delivered as I write this, and plans are in place for a few needed furniture items for the living room.
In the meantime, takeout, a real bed, and a reasonably functional bathroom have worked wonders for making my new apartment a home.
This isn’t my first move. It wasn’t until my freshman year of high school that I even lived in this state.
Born in Kansas, I grew up in Kansas, Iowa, Indiana and Ohio before moving to my most recent home.
Packing boxes, saying farewells and see-you-laters, early mornings with donuts for breakfast while systematically wedging a U-Haul full to the brim, like some kind of strange Tetris game supervised by my father—these rituals repeated every few years for most of my life.
And then they stopped. I spent my high school freshman year in a second story apartment in Shawnee, Oklahoma before moving to a house across town.
There, I stayed.
I went to college as a commuter student, so the dorm moving-in day was absent, and after graduating a year ago, I started my professional life writing for the Countywide & Sun living in that same house, saving funds, and planning toward my future.
Until Thursday, April 27, when I co-signed a lease for an apartment in Edmond.
And Friday, April 28, when I moved my clothes and essentials to my new home.
The sheer lack of distance breaks the pattern I used to know so well.
There’s no crossing state lines.
There’s no U-Haul— just my boyfriend and I’s cars, and a borrowed pickup.
It isn’t a long one-way trip.
And the best part, there’s no farewells to say, there are only see-you-soons.
The address may be different, but I’m still right here.