Going Nowhere

I have had cause lately to reassess where I'm living. Presently I'm in the North Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles. It is where I have been most of the time I've lived in LA, with the balance being a year in Highland Park, two months in Glendale, one month in Koreatown and three weeks in Burbank. I have been happiest here, and even more so in the fashionable end than I was in the  rougher end.

I have become very comfortable here, and have found that there is little I need that lies outside of the area. Of course I find it necessary to go all over on account of auditions, shows and activities initiated by friends who have clearly not considered the virtues of keeping things close to where I live. Still, I do sometimes entertain the idea of being elsewhere, but the result is usually that I resolve to stay where I'm at.

I'll Show You: Part One

I was reading an old post from this blog today. That post was about an early improv show in which I performed. It holds up better than much of what I wrote then. I don't often go back and look at such things, particularly from as far back as that. Sometimes I find myself reading a post after it turns up in a search I conduct to see whether or not I've written about something I have an idea for. I hate the idea of repeating myself, so I do my best to avoid it. In this case, I stumbled on something that was interesting to look at in light of more recent developments. I've just recently done my latest show, and while I haven't written about those so much since the early days of this blog, it seemed worth doing this time around.

There ought to be a record of this kind of thing, and regrettably a technical glitch prevented our segment of the showcase from being videotaped. I won't be able to objectively and thoroughly convey it as that would have, but I'll do my best. The day did not start as well as it might have. The day before, I had been on set acting in a film, and I believe I left the case for my cell phone in the car which drove me home. I don't care for complainers who harp on that sort of thing, but you have to know that to appreciate my frantic, obsessed journey out of the house the morning and afternoon the day of the show.

Remote Outpost

It's another day, and another missive on the subject of moving. Now that I am living in Glendale for this short stretch of time, I've been in four different places around town. Three out of the four of them were not exactly where I wanted to be. Had I known much about the city's geography, the fourth might well have not been either. The primary reason, as any realtor will telp you, is location. I just seem to keep winding up in distant, unfashionable parts of town- emphasis for my present purposes on distant.

I don't enjoy moving, so it tends to happen only out of dire necessity. Previously I only moved when my building was foreclosed on and each return home raised the question of whether the lights would still be on. That being said, I do try to make the most of the opportunity that presents itself, however unwelcome the means by which it does so. Every time I move, it's with the intention of getting nearer to the city center, but like the protagonist of Quantum Leap, my hopes are invariably dashed. From Koreatown I moved to Highland Park. From there I went to North Hollywood, which has proved to be my longest stop at two years.

Primae Noctem

I wrote at length recently about the grim, waning days in a soon-to-be-departed domicile. The corresponding experience to that, of course, is the brand new day that dawns as one comes out the other side into a new home. I'll always remember the first night my family spent in our new house back when I was around ten years old, as well as the closing days in the rented house where we had lived prior. That old house will always be known to me by the name of the woman who then owned it. I can't bear learning of any changes to the place, and haven't been by it since we moved out. That final day, I remember how we casually sat in a bedroom and watched a game show- it may have been Joker's Wild. After the arduous period of moving out of there and into the new house (in which I played little part), it was a very happy occasion. The living room was filled with boxes and indiscriminately placed furniture. The rest of the house was largely likewise, the worst of all being the garage.

What I really remember is that living room, though. We had the tv functioning, and were watching some movie I can't remember. I don't think any of us was all that interested in watching that particular thing so much as we were in watching something. It's really one of my earlier memories of the whole family watching something. We were supping on that traditional moving day dinner, delivered pizza. This was when they were quite serious about getting it to you in 30 minutes or less, and before there were any gimmicks in the pizza business. It was a good night. I don't really remember beyond that- in my mind time basically skips from there to the 92-93 NBA playoffs, when my beloved Suns were finally defeated for the championship in six games by the hated and treacherous Bulls.

The Order Of Procession

It's another day and another opportunity for musing on the act of moving from a fresh angle. As the day for actually beginning to move draws closer, I have been giving thought to the practical consideration of what should go first. Of course, should everything go in one day, then it makes little difference except what the vehicles to be used can accommodate. Unfortunately, it seems most likely that the moving process will stretch out across multiple days. That being the case, it will in fact be necessary to identify the possessions that will need to stay in the old place as long as it is where I'll be sleeping. I can't say that I've fully been able to think it all out, but the consequences of not getting it exactly right are probably bearable.

The first things I thought of that I can do without are my books and dvds. As much as I value them, the importance of being able to access any of them at a moment's notice during a given seven day period is such that I should be able to cope. One or two books will stay, and that ought to be adequate. After that there are few easy choices. One would probably be much of my clothes and kitchen implements. There will be a need only for a small amount of each during the transitory period. Unclean clothes can go, and then be washed on the other end as needed. Dishes and so forth can all go with the exception of the bare minimum to eat meals and then be washed again for the next meal. That mostly takes care of the small items, but this is not to say that large items will not be interspersed as space allows.

The Penultimate Move

I've written some about my impending move to new quarters here in Los Angeles, and the the day is just about upon us. In all the times that I moved, which is admittedly not many, there has been an interestingly grim kind of feeling as the bitter end draws near. One by one, your possessions become inaccessible as they go into a box and get sealed up, or are sold and given away. Various utilities and services begin to go offline, and you start to fear touching anything or using anything in the place, lest it require any kind of cleaning or repair that would jeopardize that great brass ring, the deposit. Of course, this particular move is different from most, given that it will itself be a temporary situation. In that, it's most like the summers I've spent working at Boy Scout camp. There's also a similarity specifically to the dorms I lived in during college, especially the one I was in for a summer semester.

As I said, I'm boxing things up. I wanted to watch a dvd the other day, and decided against it because it had already gone into a box and I preferred not to disrupt things. I'm sure you would have guessed that there's no rhyme or reason to what goes into what boxes, and they certainly won't be labeled or destined for a particular room in the new place. They'll all just go into the biggest room, I'm sure, and I may just get it all sorted out by the time I must move out. The furniture and big items will be easier, most likely. It was my hope to reduce the quantity of perishable possessions by move day- namely, food- but I've met with limited success on that front. There will probably be a box of food that shall go directly into the kitchen, but I must be careful to be neat about it, and not create a mess from day one in a home which I don't really see as mine, so little time will I spend there.

If You Want It, You Don't Got It

I've mentioned that I'm moving shortly. Among the many interesting angles to this is is the practical consideration of the means by which one's possessions are safely consolidated and secured for the trip to their new home, however near or far it may be. Once in college, I moved from one dorm to another a couple blocks down the street. I did it all myself in a couple of trips with the aid of a jury-rigged rolling cart-box furnished by the dorm I was leaving. I left nothing behind, taking even the least remnants of food from the refrigerator. It was quick, easy and cheap. I didn't even have to spring for pizza to offer as thanks, which is good, because I don't know that I could have very easily. Of course, that's the lowest order of difficulty that moving comes in, strictly in terms of moving the stuff. The hardest would be something like when my family moved to the house that my parents still live in now, as there was so much stuff destined for all manner of different places in the new home.

What I'm dealing with now is somewhere in the middle, closer to the easy end. What's on my mind now is a very specific element of the process: boxes. The importance of and demand for boxes fluctuates wildly depending on the circumstances. Ordinarily, as boxes accumulate one disposes of them with the zeal of characters in a war movie who must lighten their chopper in order to escape at the end of some desperate mission. Consequently, when the day comes that one knows they are moving and badly, direly needs boxes, none are around. The change in attitude is as severe and sudden as a light switch. Even should it not be so for some, the effect is often the same when one is accustomed to small living quarters which don't tolerated the presence of seldom-needed, space-occupying possessions. Thus, the box hunt is on! A box hunt is joined with far greater urgency than a fox hunt. The latter is mere sport- a diversion. The former is undertaken for nothing less than survival.

While The Clock Ticked

I have mentioned that I will soon be moving. Thus has been precipitated the hunt for new digs. There's some amount of interest for me in the search- a small amount which is largely outweighed by the unease of uncertainty and the onerous, energy and time intensive process. I do somewhat like considering the life I may live in each place, based on what it offers and where it is. The last time I moved, I settled on something found on Craigslist at the deadline. It had the virtue of being a place I had been approved for, which could not be said for any other places. I have enjoyed the specific amenities of four walls and a roof, but now hope for something more.

As they say, location is paramount. I hope to find something very central. Important in my case is to find something in an area where there is a great abundance of reliable public transportation options. It will be very much to the credit of any place I consider if it is near a train station as well as a bus which runs 24 hours a day. To have a place like that again, as I once did, would allow me to rely less on kind friends who will surely report their sympathy for me exhausted before too long. Of course, a significant uptick in my fortunes would render this particular consideration somewhat less important, but the general idea of being in the middle of it all would still appeal to me considerably. Downtown and Hollywood are on my list.

Move It On Over

Something rather unexpected happened a few days ago at the homestead. It looks as if I will be moving out of my place and into a new one in about a month, not so long after the time I expect this blog to reach 400 posts. The knowledge that I am not long for the apartment I sit in as I write this of course let me to reflect on the past two years here. I guess that's not very long to live in one place, but I managed to get a lot into that time. Most of what I have accomplished in LA has happened while I have lived here. My early, nascent days happened first at the hostel in Koreatown for a month and then at the split-level duplex in Highland Park for the following year, but North Hollywood is kind of where I've found my way out here.

I wasn't eager to move here. I had left Highland Park, where I was very happy, because of a crisis in whose making I had no part. The owners had been pocketing rent checks and not paying the mortgage without saying anything, so it was very interesting to come home to a foreclosure notice on the door one night. The owners had been paying the utilities, so we came to realize the lights could go off any time, and the bank informed us upon taking possession that they would not be charging rent but might decide to demand all back rent at any time. It seemed right to get out, and I took about the first thing I could off of Craigslist.

My Itinerant Tribe

I was saying in regards to my activities yesterday (a jam-packed day which left no time or energy to write), that it seems like when you're young, it often happens that one friend or another is moving and needs help. The good part of that is that in one's 20s, there are relatively few possessions to uproot and transfer to the new place. It's even easier during college. I remember once moving from one dorm to another a few blocks away. I moved everything by myself in a cart with two or three trips. It took less time than I spent yesterday.

When one gets older, however, it seems to me that the moves among one's friends, family and acquaintances grow less frequent but more difficult. Happily, I'm still in that good "young moving" area. It's kind of a pleasant and festive vibe, and the camaraderie together with soda and two pizzas are compensation enough.

Post Script

Of course, I ought to mention and properly describe the rest of what happened Sunday, which was that I helped a friend move most of the day. My friend is moving to Arizona, and so a few of his friends who live there came here to help him out, and together they had a Uhaul truck and a pickup truck with a shell over the flatbed.

Immediately after church, I talked to him, and agreed to help out. He said he'd meet me at my place and bring me over, and I thought that I'd be back from church before he got there. In fact, the opposite happened, and I walked straight to his vehicle in front of my building.

So we got started sometime around noon, and were done for the day maybe ten hours or so later. I have to say right off that my friend has the hoarding powers of ten men, and beats the hell out of my hoarding. This is especially true because he hoards food as well. Things went well enough, although we ended up running out of boxes, and wouldn't have gotten through everything in the house even if we'd had the boxes. So we had some pizza, and I went home. It was a productive day.