So we are back to

So we are back to looking for apartments. As much as there is to like about our little place, there is also the wafting of smoke from cigarettes and pot that comes into our apartment ALL THE TIME from the 20-somethings that live below us. And unlike the loudness issue, it doesn’t seem like the kind of thing that could be fixed by talking to the landlord (their stepfather). Also, we took a walk around Windsor Terrace, which is where the apartment is that we’re looking at tomorrow, and it is quite nice. We immediately assessed the advantages to being away from 4th Avenue and closer to the park. The apartment sounds nice in theory (don’t they all) but there are two distinct things that have me worried. One: “wall-to-wall carpeting.” Who has wall-to-wall carpeting in Brooklyn? Who has a vacuum cleaner? What if it’s mauve? Actually, J has been very clear that if the carpet is mauve: it’s a deal-breaker.

Two: it is three doors down from a funeral home. It goes law office (apt above), optical wear store, beauty supply, funeral home. And it’s not really the dead people that skeeve me out, but the fact that I’d have to see mourning people all the time. Lots of sad sad people dressed in black. How often would I encounter this? Would I get used to it? Would it slowly eat away at my soul?

Of course this is all moot anyway if the apartment is shitty, but these things are good to keep in mind, whether one could comfortably live next door to a funeral home. It is also right across from a giant Catholic church. Do Catholic churches have loud bells on Sunday?

Moving: ugh. It’s such a weird thing, too, because part of me expects to move into a home once J and I are married. That’s what I picture: us being married in a house and the future there in front of us. However, the reality is that if we stay in New York, we’ll be renting for a long time. I also refuse to even think about kids while renting an apartment in New York, so the future I see in these apartments remains shortlived. This of course contrasts elegantly with the future I see with my job, which I love and want to stay with for a long time.

My thoughts get so tied up in knots when I try to unravel what we’ll do in one year, two years, 5 years, that I always come to the conclusion that I have to wait for them to relax over time and unwind themselves. I feel like at some point, I’ll find my thoughts in a nice uncomplicated string and I’ll know it’s time to move to Arizona and open a cafe or buy a house in Maplewood or whatever. It doesn’t stop me from getting worked up and prodding the knot now and again hoping it will reveal itself.

I’m somehow on every single wedding-related mailing list and get all sorts of great things in the mail now. We have a great photographer, who’s also a good friend, lined up to do our wedding, but I must say I was awfully tempted by this little postcard:

I’m not sure what the car is doing there in the first place, but please note it actually appears to be ON TOP OF the water. I mean, seriously. Can it get any better?

UPDATE: It just occured to me to go to their website. Glory!

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