(image) Eli and I enjoying a mid-summer, back yard, afternoon
Twenty-Eight hours ago Eli and I were walking from our house to the MAX station at 4:30 a.m. It was still dark outside when we woke up to our empty room.
All my things were packed into labeled boxes, all of his into black garbage sacks and stacked separately in the garage of the house where we lived. We both knew we would be coming home separately, so there was no sense dividing it then because the future is undefined by both of us. The only certainty was that someone else would be living in this room, our room, in 4 days so this is the last time we would see the brown textured wall paper peeling away from warped violet walls.
Because of the interesting circumstances that had Eli and I move in together just one week after we began dating our space looked more like a dorm than a love nest - and to the outsider we looked more like roommates than a couple. One room: two desks (one industrial steel, the other oak with courier shelves), two night stands (actually, to be fair, one of them was a coffee table turned night stand), two laundry baskets, and two beds which we pushed together make one giant bed that was 3/4 of the width of our room. The only open floor space was a small path that lead from one side of the bed to the closet where the hang bar buckled under the weight of my winter wardrobe and Eli's four leather jackets.
As we moved around our silent house, which is so rarely quiet, it looked and felt less like home. Leaving in the darkness felt like the retreat of a one-night lover, an action that says 'this doesn't mean anything' and 'goodbye'. And that's not how it felt to live there. My life (and eardrums) were always full, and I enjoyed a luxury few other new couples do: waking up next to someone every morning, and freedom from the uncertainty. It was never a choice to live together, it was an unusual gift, and even as we left for our big adventure together I wondered whether I was also walking away from what we knew as our life together; if it will carry on in another room, or simply end as an Argentinian affair to remember.
When the door shuts behind me for the last time it lacks the ellipses of creaks and coming and going. It sounds different, it sounds final. I can hear in the latch that no matter what becomes of Eli and I, when the patio feels my steps again there would only be one foot fall, not two.
All my things were packed into labeled boxes, all of his into black garbage sacks and stacked separately in the garage of the house where we lived. We both knew we would be coming home separately, so there was no sense dividing it then because the future is undefined by both of us. The only certainty was that someone else would be living in this room, our room, in 4 days so this is the last time we would see the brown textured wall paper peeling away from warped violet walls.
Because of the interesting circumstances that had Eli and I move in together just one week after we began dating our space looked more like a dorm than a love nest - and to the outsider we looked more like roommates than a couple. One room: two desks (one industrial steel, the other oak with courier shelves), two night stands (actually, to be fair, one of them was a coffee table turned night stand), two laundry baskets, and two beds which we pushed together make one giant bed that was 3/4 of the width of our room. The only open floor space was a small path that lead from one side of the bed to the closet where the hang bar buckled under the weight of my winter wardrobe and Eli's four leather jackets.
As we moved around our silent house, which is so rarely quiet, it looked and felt less like home. Leaving in the darkness felt like the retreat of a one-night lover, an action that says 'this doesn't mean anything' and 'goodbye'. And that's not how it felt to live there. My life (and eardrums) were always full, and I enjoyed a luxury few other new couples do: waking up next to someone every morning, and freedom from the uncertainty. It was never a choice to live together, it was an unusual gift, and even as we left for our big adventure together I wondered whether I was also walking away from what we knew as our life together; if it will carry on in another room, or simply end as an Argentinian affair to remember.
When the door shuts behind me for the last time it lacks the ellipses of creaks and coming and going. It sounds different, it sounds final. I can hear in the latch that no matter what becomes of Eli and I, when the patio feels my steps again there would only be one foot fall, not two.
this post made me cry. you need to write a novel. on a vintage typewriter. maybe when you come home you can live with me :) oh yeah, i think we already discussed this haha. we could share closets, cameras, art, a front porch covered with plants and books, stories, and love. oh and maybe boyfriends with the same name.. it's not like we're soul twins or anything.
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