Where Was I? [Long but really good!]

Oh, right.  Los Angeles.  Los Angeles, Los Angeles, Los Angeles.  Well, I’ll give you the most up-to-date information as of today.  I should be getting my check (the money, honey) this Friday…and at the very latest, next Friday.  Either way, I’ll have it at least two weeks before I leave.  It’s what was holding up everything.  I could look at places, but really only dream and/or wish because I had no way to pay them for the space to rent.  Either way, I have a time frame to let managers know when I can send them a deposit check more than just a "well, I’m hoping to leave at the end of June…"

Also, I have the best boy in the world who is so sweet and trying to work his butt off so he can move at the same time as I do.  It was the original plan, but he’s recently discovered that he is short of funds, and so he was torn as to when he could/should move.  We talked about it today and he’s going to check into a few places for each of us this Friday (which is what makes him the best boy ever because it’s at least an hour drive from Anaheim…one way.) and although it’ll be hard to live in the same building, and therefore not too likely, none of the places is more than a couple miles…definitely walking distance…from each other.  And…AND one of the places he’s checking out is a Bachelor unit…meaning it has no full kitchen (just a fridge and microwave)…so I told him that I guess that means we’ll have a long-standing dinner date in my kitchen every night.  I’m not complaining.

I never really shared the whole story, but the jist of it is this:  I got slapped upside the head with the notion to move to Los Angeles last June.  Asked my best friend if she wanted to go too and she said yes.  When she backed out, I started to question my reasons and motives for going.  I really didn’t want it to just be for the best boy in the world.  So, I did what we crazy Christians do…I prayed about it.  I prayed and prayed and asked God for a sign.  (Cliche, I know…but just wait.)  I thought about it and thought, okay, what’s a good sign?  Nothing stupid like "if I see a red car today…ooh!  There’s one!  I’m supposed to go to California!"  No…something realistic and something that if it happened, I would know I’m supposed to go.  So, what would be a good sign for a poor grad student who was about to quit her job?  Ahhh…a way out there…namely, the money. 

I surmised that the bare minimum I’d need would be about $1,500…quite a large chunk of change for a kid with no job.  Two weeks after I started praying about it, my professor asked me to be his graduate assistant and said they would pay me, at the end of the school year, you guessed it…$1,500.  As naive as I was, God saw fit to provide what I thought I needed…and then some.  To date, I have (including the $1,500 from the assistantship) at least $3,000 and another $3,000 we already had stored up for me to live on through September when I’d get my first teaching paycheck.  So, I’m leaving the great state of Tennessee with about $6,000.

I’m definitely going…just as soon as I can line up an apartment and get a truck.  Between now and the 26th (moving day), I will be:  working a part-time job, packing, figuring out my loan consolidation stuff, packing, having a yard sale, packing, conducting my thesis presentation again, packing, training a puppy (more to come another time…but isn’t he the cutest teddy bear ever?!), packing, figuring up a budget for moving and expenses, and packing.

Onto my dad:  Picture it: Holiday Inn, Mother’s Day, 2006.  We’re sitting at lunch and I quietly tell my mom that the Redondo Beach school district sent me an application, thinking that my dad wouldn’t hear me because he was talking to someone else.  I was wrong.  He said:

"Where’s that?" 
"California." 
"So, you’re thinking about moving there?"
"Yeah."
"So, you’re going to leave us…"
"Well, yeah, but I figure I’m single and not tied down so I can visit whenever I want…just takes a part of a paycheck or two."
"Hmm…okay."

And that was the end of it.

Since then, he has cracked jokes about me calling from California (because the Caller ID showed "out of area"), helped me plan my route, explained to me how the traffic works in LA (he once went on a motorcycle roadtrip out there with his best friend), told me what was so special about the Grand Canyon ("Not a whole lot…it’s just where the water drained out."), and explained to my mother that I would most certainly be able to drive a 14′ Uhaul truck with my car hitched on a dolly on the back.  Oh, and told me not to let my dog cause me to wreck the truck.

<span style=”font-family: arial narrow;”>So, with dad’s blessing, I’m heading west.  And I only have 20 days, 12 hours and 24 minutes before I do it.

Screenplay for my life:  Will & Grace