Say What?

Today I was getting off the Metrobus when an old man with a cane and a panama hat grabbed me by the shoulder and began telling me something very sternly. I was on my cell phone at the time and so I completely missed most of what he said, something about my hands not being where they were supposed to be. I left the station and as it happened we boarded the same bus on Eje 6. I sat down quietly next to him, not having any idea of what to say, so I pulled out the book I'm currently reading, which happens to be Carlos Castaneda's Journey to Ixtlan. I began reading which prompted him to start talking again and again I couldn't understand his words except that he said that he was a better or greater doctor than me and something about the black letters of the book. He was very deliberate in whatever he said and he grabbed onto my wrist as he spoke... it might have been nonsense, which would account for my total lack of understanding, but he spoke with great conviction... whatever it was. Then he silently stood up and got off at the next stop. As the bus sped off I watched him stalk away, my mouth hanging as if dislocated.

Quivering Leaf

"Que lejos estoy del cielo donde he nacido. Inmensa nostalgia invade mi pensamiento. Ahora que estoy tan solo y triste cual hoja al viento, quisiera llorar, quisiera reir de sentimiento."

We did not speak for a long while. He finally broke the silence.
"Since the day you were born, one way or another, someone has been doing something to you," he said.
"That's correct," I said.
"And they have been doing something to you against your will."
"True."
"And by now you're helpless, like a leaf in the wind."
"That's correct. That's the way it is."
I said that the circumstances of my life had sometimes been devastating. He listened attentively but I could not figure out if he was being agreeable or genuinely concerned until I noticed that he was trying to hide a smile.
"No matter how much you feel sorry for yourself, you have to change that," he said in a soft tone. "It doesn't jibe with the life of a warrior."
He laughed and sang the song again but contorted the intonations of certain words; the result was a ludicrous lament. He pointed out that the reason I had liked the song was because in my own life I had done nothing but find flaws with everything and lament. I could not argue with him. He was correct. Yet I believed that I had sufficient reasons to justify my feeling of being like a leaf in the wind.
"The hardest thing in the world is to assume the mood of a warrior," he said. "It is of no use to be sad and complain and feel justified in doing so, believing that someone is always doing something to us. Nobody is doing anything to anybody, much less to a warrior."
"You are here, with me, because you want to be here. You should have assumed full resposibility by now, so the idea that you are at the mercy of the wind would be inadmissable."
"Self-pity doesn't jibe with power," he said. "The mood of a warrior calls for control over himself and at the same time it calls for abandoning himself."
"How can that be?" I asked. "How can he control and abandon himself at the same time?"
"It is a difficult technique," he said.

Playa Caleta Pt. II

Lemme tellya a lil bit bout where I'm living now.

I moved south to delgacion Iztacalco, colonia Iztaccihuatl, about a month ago. It's kinda close to where I used to live in Coapa, but still central enough that I'm only 30-45 min from most of the places I visit and work at. I guess you could say that I live in what translates in Mexico City as the suburbs. They aren't planned communities like the suburbs in the States with curvy lanes weaving around cookie-cutter houses and postage stamp lawns, the streets are hashed out in grids and the gated entrances or the houses themselves come right out to the sidewalk so everything's walled in on both sides. Instead of front lawns most houses have patios, some with elaborate gardens of potted plants consuming every open space and bare wall until all you can see is the green of the leaves and the array of colorful blooms. Mexico City is truly the city of eternal Spring; here the flowers bloom year round. All the streets in my neighbrhood are named after (famous?) beaches, mine for example is Playa Caleta. It's almost like living near the ocean. It's customary for each colonia (neighborhood) to name all their streets with some sort of theme in mind, mountains, states of mexico, states of america, countries of europe, lakes, rivers, famous people leaders from history, artists, etc, etc, etc... (if you know of any of the other themes, leave a comment about it).

There aren't any bars and movie theatres and malls all over like in other parts of the city, things are pretty quiet here, but all the common businesses are no more than a few blocks away. Within a five minute's walk there's at least 7 corner stores, a barber shop, a park with a playground and running track, two taco restuarants, a papeleria (office supplies), the gym, and numerous bus stops. Within 10 minutes walking is an indoor market, a grocery store, several pastry and candy shops, and the subway station (El Metro). And, obviously, there's your standard camp of street vendors selling fresh squeezed and blended juices, fresh fruit, newspapers, tortas (grilled sandwiches served on a white bun with avocado and chipotle or raja chili peppers), seasoned and toasted nuts, fresh pastries, and pirated DVDs. All that's missing nearby is a bank, a movie theatre, and a discount pharmacy, but they're not too far away.

My house is a split level with us on the bottom and Marco, who's a message therapist, up top. I share the house with Francisco (the owner) and Cesar. Francisco is a theatre-actor/director/teacher and Cesar is an artist/dancer/activist. Francisco speaks a bit of english though we mostly speak in Spanish and they've both been very patient with my sometimes slow grasp of coversation. They're both laid back, openly smoke pot, and bang and boogie on their drums. At first I thought Francisco was gay... mostly because he walks around topless in cut-off jeans and there's a giant blue dildo sitting on one of the tables... but I've come to the conclusion that he's just flambuoyantly artsy. Francisco goes to his hometown of Pachuca pretty often and Cesar is out most of the day, so when I'm here I often have the house to myself.

The house has a pretty typical regional layout; outdoor car port, lots of windows, there's a washer outside on the patio by the kitchen with some clothes lines, and there's a "finished" rooftop with more plants and clothes lines. As you'll see the house is very artfully decorated and literally crawling with plants. Right out my bedroom window a garden is enclosed by the house; I often see birds and little lizards (salamanders?) scamping around in the early mornings and afternoons. It's one of the few gardens that I've seen planted right into the earth, blanketed with thick grass. Sometimes I go out there barefoot and read or sunbathe, it's really relaxing and quiet. Last week I noticed a very familiar green plant sprouting from the soil... do they attract me or do I attract them? Maybe I'm just throwing my seeds too far... :

There's no piped-in gas in the city, so large gas tanks have to be bought and replaced periodically... which is kind of a pain cuz the gas guy doesn't come everyday and sometimes we're left without hot water and stove fuel for days at a time. There's an assortment of bells, whistles, and chimes that denote the coming of the gas man, the water man, the garbage man, or the sweet potato man, so it's been tricky differentiating between the orchestra of noises (not to mention the three man band that comes on the weekends playing their beat-up sax, toy drum, and tin can half full with jangly change), but I'm getting the hang of it. Luckily, if I get hungry on one of those no-gas days, right out my doorstep is the 'McPigly' where I can get a cold bottle of Coke and a cheeseburger for under $2.

(BTW, Blogger sucks big asscrack when it comes to uploading pics... this took nearly an hour. See why I don't post pics more often?)

Playa Caleta Pt. III

Playa Caleta Pt.IV

Busboy

The buses here are crazy, I mean crazy. First off you can hail them almost anywhere like a taxi, which is conveniant, and they don't always come to a stop, usually they slow down just enough so that you can board on and off while kinda half-running. Also conveniant. Another difference is that these buses appear to be the property of the driver, I guess. They all have them decorated in their own various ways and many have customized sound systems. The other day I got on a bus that had these huge sub woofers hooked up under the seats in back, that bus could boom. Cars here don't do the thing with the hydrolics with the switches (for tha bitches) but if they did the buses would prolly have that too.

This morning I got on one with Mad Max behind the wheel. Remember that game Paperboy? It was like that, but with a five ton bus instead of a bike and men, women and children instead of newspapers. At one point we started racing a rival bus; both were full of people and they were going at it like it was the Indy 500. I thought we were going to crash for sure when my bus veered into the other bus's lane, cutting it off, leaving us miraculously with an inch to spare. They told each other to go fuck their mothers while my bus gleaned what would have been the other bus's passengers, then we went along on our merry way. I got to work in record time. Crazy.

Where's My Ocean?

Em,

There's some things I'd wished that I'd told you before now but never got the chance. Things that have echoed in my head since we were just kids.

I loved you very much. I loved your openly inquisitive nature, your poetic language, your stillness. I loved your hands and I loved your eyes but I was afraid of them too; afraid those hands wouldn't hold me and that those eyes would not regard me any more. I was afraid of losing you and so held you tighter to my chest, but your breath escaped through my fingers and my breath could not suffice your own. Like that, I strangled you in my arms over and over again and then I left you breathless and alone because I couldn't stand to watch you respire without me. I am so sorry. I'm sorry I locked you up inside of me. I'm sorry I depended on you for my happiness. I'm sorry our friends wrongfully turned against you. I'm sorry I tried to hurt you and I'm sorry that I did. I'm sorry I've been punishing you in my heart ever since. You once wrote that you would do anything to erase the hurt from my face; it was never your doing to cleanse. My hurt came from somewhere deeper and you should never have been made my savior nor my suffering should have ever been made yours. I've resented you for dismissing me years after, but now please be unchained from my past. I don't know what you think of me anymore and I'm not going to hope to know. I won't wish to see you again, I won't ask to know why I can't. Slumber in the passages of my memory.

I'll always think of you well.

Goodbye.

-Tim

Welcome to the new gym, same as the old gym

Well, it's a little different than my last one. They have pictures hanging everywhere of half naked women, big bumpy muscle men who look like they're covered in tumors, and one completely nude 500 lb woman, so I'm never completely sure where it's safe to look. I'm discovering that when they say the personal trainer is included, they mean the personal trainer is present, but he'll only pay you any mind if you have tits and a pussy. It's the same story as before, though with less tongue wagging. Either the personal trainer is sitting around or he's spooning or making out or playing grab-ass with his woman. So mostly I'm on my own. One strange thing is you can't bring your own water. You have to buy their water ehich is jacked up to 18 pesos for 1.5 liters - and they only sell 1.5 liters. I have to drink water while I'm lifting, I have to, so that means that going 5 times a week for a month would cost $360, that's almost as much as I'm paying for the fucking membership. I've been keeping water in my locker and sneaking sips in between sets... which is okay for now. Another thing is they don't appear to clean their gym. Usually, unlike in the states, the cleaning people constantly clean up around everyone during normal working hours, instead of cleaning after hours. I haven't seen any cleaning crew so I assume they prolly don't clean much at all. Well it seemed like a good deal at first, but I may start looking for a different gym...

I was surprised that after not lifting for nearly a week and a half my capacity had increased greatly, in some cases I was lifting 11 and 12 kilos more than I had 2 weeks before. Actually the routine has been kind of easy... the new trainer has me doing a different set of exercises than I had been before so it may take a little while before I can find my maximum threshold again. In the meantime I'm getting big in all the right places. :)

Whistle Worthy

This cute teenage girl whistled at me from the flatbed of a truck today. I about choked on the water I was chugging when I realized who she was whistling at. I took the last gulp with this big doufus grin on my face, water trickling down my chin and my eyes all agape. I turned around and quickly paced off while all those skinny girls from behind me giggled and whooped. HAHAHAHahahahaHAHAHAHA - I've gotta be more careful when I wear my muscle shirts.

I am such a dork, whenever I notice a girl checking me out I get totally embarrased and start smiling all self consciously... Jeez, how old am I?! ...what a lamer... HAHAHAhahahaHAHAHA

Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine

I certainly haven't been shopping for any new shoes
-and-
I certainly haven't been spreading myself around
I still only travel by foot and by foot, it's a slow climb,
But I'm good at being uncomfortable, so
I can't stop changing all the time

I notice that my opponent is always on the go
-and-
Won't go slow, so's not to focus, and I notice
He'll hitch a ride with any guide, as long as
They go fast from whence he came
- But he's no good at being uncomfortable, so
He can't stop staying exactly the same

If there was a better way to go then it would find me
I can't help it, the road just rolls out behind me
Be kind to me, or treat me mean
I'll make the most of it, I'm an extraordinary machine

I seem to you to seek a new disaster every day
You deem me due to clean my view and be at piece and lay
I mean to prove I mean to move in my own way, and say,
I've been getting along for long before you came into the play

I am the baby of the family, it happens, so
- Everybody cares and wears the sheeps' clothes
While they chaperone
Curious, you looking down your nose at me, while you appease
- Courteous, to try and help - but let me set your
Mind at ease

-Do I so worry you, you need to hurry to my side?
-It's very kind
But it's to no avail; I don't want the bail
I promise you, everything will be just fine

If there was a better way to go then it would find me
I can't help it, the road just rolls out behind me
Be kind to me, or treat me mean
I'll make the most of it, I'm an extraordinary machine

Shitstorm

I'm finally settling down here; finding my way around yet another part of this endless city, getting back into a routine, putting the pieces back together. I have a new home, a new room, new roommates, new neighborhood, new gym, new subway... basically a new life. You know how at the top there ^^ I describe [my] life as a vast ocean where I struggle forward against the waves that hurl me back... well this last wave was a fucking behemoth and although I was expecting it I was totally unprepared for its destructiveness. I got the rug pulled out from under me. Maybe I was asking for it... days before the shit hit the fan I had been talking about how I needed to be single and strong when bad things happen, then they happened, I almost moved in with my ex, N, then I dumped her and dealt with it all by myself - after initially freaking out for a few days. Then I got my strength and clarity back and I did what needed to be done and all by myself (mostly). Everything seemed to play out just like I had written it would. But whether I asked for it or not, I got through and now I'm going to put it all down so I can stop reflecting and get a move on. Then I'm going to write better things so that *good things* can happen instead.

Everything first began when Mitzy told me that she needed me to be out at the end of the month - April. She was hesitant to explain her reasons why, so I presumed it was because of something I'd done. She confessed that she was pregnant and she was going to make my room into the nursery. I congratulated her and said I understood completly; I wouldn't want a stanger living in the same house with my first newborn either and besides that I didn't want to be another illegal alien live-in nanny. So that was fine, but I appealed that a month was too abrubt for me, that I'd been going through a rough patch (for a couple years) and that their house was really the only stability I felt my life had and I'd need some time to find another place that could meet my needs w/o throwing my whole life into upset. I asked for six months at the most, giving her plenty of time to redecorate my bedroom and what-all and giving me time to find something accomidating for myself. She agreed. I was so releived; instead of being kicked out at the end of the month I had a cushy buffer zone in which to make a more deliberate life transition. That the routine and stability that my life had adopted wouldn't get knocked on it's ass.... then a couple weeks later she heedlessly kicked me out.

Lemme back up a little bit and talk about Mitzy and Vincent. When I first moved in I met with M and V independantly on separate days. M spoke in Spanish and told me that she was "only renting the room" and that I could only use the kitchen for breakfast, but that I still *could* use their utensils, etc. There was a mini-fridge upstairs where I could keep my food and another cabinet downstairs. V spoke in English and told me that I could share their kitchen whenever, that I could use their living room, and that I could stay for as long as I wanted. I continued to get these opposing messages from them for the duration of my stay there; V was more like "our home is your home" and M was more like "pretend like you don't exist". M was in charge I guess, which was too bad because Vince was actually nice to me. M stopped acknowledging me after the first month. At first she was smily and attentive, but then all of a sudden I could rarely get her to lift her head and grunt for my greetings. As the months went on she grew more distant in her relations with me, but I didn't really care because I only saw her once or twice a day for maybe a few seconds and I rarely needed to talk to her at any length. Eventually I stopped saying hi to her at all. Then in March we started butting heads for the first time because I had begun using their kitchen on a daily basis, back when I first started going to the old gym.

I had gone to the grocery with the intent of creating a healthy diet and what I brought back was put in the cabinet I had been told to use. Then later that day I find all of my food dumped out on the table; no M, no explanation. (later she'd pile up my dry clothes and dishes in the same way). I considered bringing the food up to my room, but decided to just leave it scattered on the table as it lay; aware that this would force M to explain herself to me until I cleaned it up... if I just cleaned it up and stashed it in my room she would never discuss it and she'd just keep being a passive aggresive bitch. When she did confront me about it, it was just as I had expected, she seemed incredulous at the fact that I had a need to eat and that I would keep food in her kitchen. I asked her where I should keep it then, and she kinda scoffed and told me I could keep it in the closet outside. Okay, so I moved my food to the closet. Fine. Then it was one thing after another; I couldn't use her plates or silverware anymore, I'd have to buy my own set. She'd leave the sink and drying rack full of dishes and yelled at me when she heard me putting them away. So I had to keep my dirty dishes my bathroom sink and dry my dishes in my shower. Basically my bathroom had become the two bit set of a half rate cooking show.

Then she started complaining about the electricity for the first time. She tried to tell me that I was using thousands of pesos worth of electricity every month that I wasn't paying for. That I was leaving lights on all of the time. This is bullshit off course, there were three months I used a 500 watt space heater for a few hours a day and besides that all I had were five lights and a computer (and a blender). And I did leave lights on sometimes, I admit it, but not often at all and never for more than a few hours... nothing compared to the energy that I witnessed them useing. M would leave the lights on in her bedroom and bathroom and go out for the day, then when she'd return she'd sit outside in direct sight of all of these light she'd left on with no one to use them, and do nothing. If she really cared about the electricity she'd turn off her own goddamn lights instead blaming me.

But I was grateful that she was letting me stay an extra six months, so I gave her an extra $700 pesos with March's rent, I switched my light bulbs with those low wattage bulbs, and made a stonger effort to turn my light's off when they weren't in use. Not only that, but I had gone to great lengths to abide by her challenging restrictions. But still she continued revoking my house privelages, now I couldn't use her dishes or her blender, then I couldn't use her pots and pans, finally that I couldn't use her stove. We had a woman who came to do our laundry and clean the house and my room and M deliberatly didn't tell me that she wouldn't be coming anymore until I had found my clothes piled on the ground outside. This is all within the space of a couple of weeks. Shit was getting rediculous and I had no way to cook for myself or clean my clothes.

She was obviously doing this to force me into leaving of my own accord because she had already promised to give me more time. When driving me out didn't work she finally renegged on our agreement and told me - again - to be out by the end of April. *This* after going so far out of my way to comply with all of her stupid bullshit rules and enduring her acidic attitude towards me, after buying dishes and blenders and the light bulbs and tiptoeing all around her, after all that, any patience or sympathy that I might have had for being a respectful, loyal, docile, submissive roomer was now just as dissolved as her promise to me was. I was furious with her beyond care for restraint.

I had nowhere to go and only a week to find it. I had only started looking a few days before, so I didn't have many leads. This was when N offered to let me move in with her. I had a bad feeling about it - G had implied that she was offering her bed in some attempt to win me back or something... which didn't exactly bolster my support for this plan - so I told N that I was still going to try and find a someplace for myself and that staying with her would be a last resort... but realistically I didn't hold out much hope for finding something in the next week and a half and so figured N's was exactly where I'd end up. All of my options seemed for the worst and I was getting scared.

N and I went out that Saturday and my flowering depression seemingly brought out an allergic reaction in her. She had acted strange toward me the whole day, rebuking my personal feelings of dissapointment and rage toward my situation, rolling her eyes when I made jokes at my own expense, then she just lost her patience altogether. She told me that I was acting depressed just to play for her sympathy (as others have said before), that I was using her to fix all of my own problems, but the real ball breaker was when she said the only reason she fell in love with me to begin with was because I was just like her *mother*. Her crazy, schizophrenic, six times married mother who mentally abused her to the point where N now openly wishes for her death and general misfortune. What. The. Fuck. It didn't make sense that someone could go from being totally enamoured with me to thinking that I was just like their psycho mother in just a few weeks. It didn't seem right... (still doesn't) she had seemed so solid before. I knew I wasn't in the most stable mindset to make life impacting decisions, but there was no question, she had said something to me that was irreconcilable. I said goodbye and walked away from her and never looked back. I haven't seen or spoken to her since. This upset me terribly... because I really did love her and I missed her and she had clawed open my chest. Everything felt out of control, it seemed I had finally nosedived into the canyon.

I barely left my room for almost two days - my "safe space" which had become not-so-safe - for fear that something else bad would happen if I did. That's the closest yet that I've come to returning to Columbus since I've gotten here... but even then suicide seemed far wiser - I wasn't about to do either. The fear and loathing ran it's course and I came around on Monday, ready to find a place to live. And just like that, *, after three rooming appointments I found the one I'm at now. I decided I would either move my things straight there on the 1st or temporarily to G's house if needed, depending on how the rest played out. I had the feeling that things were going to get ugly with M. I still needed my last month's rent back and I knew she was going to screw me out of most of it. I hated her with a passion and was ready to get nasty if that's what it took. After the last couple of weeks I'd had, the need for contingency plans had become definative.

I told M to give me my last month's rent back, which I had already paid when I first moved in - and wasn't going to be useing in May since I would be kicked out by then - along with the $700 pesos I had given her for the electricity. On Tuesday we discussed the terms of my expulsion. At first she wouldn't talk to me inside of the house, she would only talk to me out on the patio, because inside was *her house* and I had no right to dwell inside of *her domain* while still possesing a single breath in my lungs - as if I even wanted to. This was how badly she wanted me out of there. But she was just being a stupid twat - I mean this was all about her house and ridding me from it - so we finally went into her office to talk. What a cunt.

First she tells me I'd been paying $50 pesos a month for cable television *when I don't even own a television* and then has the gall to try and retroactively charge me for seven months of electricity that I didn't use *either*. Out of the $3700 pesos that I was entitled (which should have been $4050 including my stolen cable money) she was only offering back $1200 - I think. I was prepared to fight her tooth and nail for all of it and the best I could threaten to do was stay there for another month - I had technically already paid for it - and this I knew would be the last thing she'd want. I demanded and held my ground and after she halfway threatening to have me deported from the country, what I ended up with was the negotiated sum of $2850 if I would get the hell out of her life in 24 hrs or less. (thanks to G for her tasteful translations throughout our final discourse together). She would hand me the cash when my last box was out the door and then slam it shut in my face forever. I was just happy to have her pay more than she wanted to. She'd thrown a fucking monkey wrench into my life plans, taken advantage of my trust and seriously shaken my foundation of hope. She had been contolling my every movement inside of her house for the last seven months and this was when I took control back. I won, you bitch. Haha, eat it.

It was a strange sensation, knowing that I would be on the street in 24hrs and having no clear place to stay the next night or the night after until the 1st of May. What was so strange was that I felt a kind of euphoria from the uncertainty of the situation; that anything could happen and would happen and very soon based solely on the effectiveness of my next few decisions. The euphoria, I think, came from the certainty that I was in control of my own destiny again that it wasn't bound by the actions of any other. I called up the guy whom I was moving in with, Francisco, and asked if I could move in a little sooner, "like tomorrow" - Wednesday - because I had just kinda lost my place of residence. He told me the soonest he'd be ready for me was on Thursday. This left me with a day in limbo with nowhere to stay, so I kicked in the contingency plan to move my stuff to Gaby's for the day and figured I'd stay either at a hotel or a hostal for the night. I packed up the rest of my life into shoeboxes and crates and boxes and garbage bags and made the arrangements to have my stuff Taxied to G's for Wednesday and then for a moving truck to move them from Gaby's to my new room on Thursday. Two moves in two days.

Wednesday morning arrived and it was time to make move #1. There was already a locksmith at the front door changing the bolts; her disgust with my presence was that tangible. The little taxi came and it took exactly 5 trips - with me in he car - to move all of my worldy possesion, 12 containers and two garbage bags holding my life, and all for only $150 pesos. Well, that was almost everything, I had to leave my PC desk out into the street; there was no place for it. I hope someone maybe adopted it, but it was a Sauder piece of junk anyways. M kept to her word for once; no sooner was my last crate in the taxi and the keys in her hand than I was seeing the door shut and grasping my $2850 pesos in pocket. We didn't verbally say goodbye.

I moved my things upstairs into G's house and stowed them up above her closet... which turned out to be much easier than getting them back down again. Once everything was put away I went and checked into the fleabag Hotel Colonia Roma for the night... seemed a wise decision after that hostel movie I'd seen. It was dirt cheap (200 pesos/night) and nice & sleazy. The guy at the front desk didn't believe me that I was by myself, he thought I'd had some bimbo hidden away that I was trying to sneak in for the night. The bathroom was like one big shower, no curtains or paneling in between any of the plumbimg; when I showered the water would spray all over the toilet and sink and the rest and then it would all drain out together by my feet. Yuck. At least I had my choice of free porn to watch and a warm vibrating bed for the night.

The next day I got up and went to teach my class, then came back to G's for move #2. This time I had a moving truck and movers to help. Before they got there I got everything down from the closet... kinda fell and fucked up my shoulder while I was getting my computer down (while my spotter had her back turned!), but managed to get everything out intact. With the movers, it only took about an hour to get it all to Itzaccihuatl (pronounced, "It's a sea waddle") and unloaded into my bedroom. I rode with them on the way... we didn't say a word. When everything was out they invited me out for a drink (was I supposed to buy them drinks??), I respectfully declined and gave them an extra $50... I would have given them more but I was getting pretty broke at that point. I put the rest of the boxes away in my room and exhaled.

It was done. After approximately 20 hrs of homelessness I was once again gainfully resided into my new home. I collapsed onto the bed and slept straight through the rest of the day and that night. I was free. I was drained.