Diary of a Move

Including the move to Jersey City, this is the fourth time I've moved since I've been here. The move to Jersey City, with the exception of the nine-hour drive, was relaiteively painless. Even the drive wasn't terrible. After all, Bryan, one of my best friends, drove most of the way.

The next move was a mere four months later. I moved out of my sister's one room apartment and into the third bedroom of an apartment owned by some friends I met shortly after moving here. Most of my stuff was already boxed up, because I never really unpacked much-there was no room to spread out.

The third move was out the apartment and back in with my sister. She had moved into a two-bedroom apartment on the third floor of a townhouse across the street. And she would pay the same amount of rent! I moved back in with her, so that she could save some money and go back to school.

That brings me to my fourth (and hopefully last for a while) move. Charity and I had been thinking about the next step for several months. She started dating someone, as did I, and the apartment was becoming a little crowded. After some discussion and a couple of ideas back and forth, nothing really happened.

I was asked to work some overtime in December. I slowly realized that the money I had made in December allowed me to get everything paid current. Combining the money I expected to get back from taxes with a couple of other small bonuses, would allow me to take the leap. I checked Craigslist, found an apartment that I might be able to afford, and made a phone call. Danny and I went to meet the realtor. This first apartment was a bit of a disappointment. It was on the first floor, and the window was basically below the street level. No light was getting into that apartment. We left in a hurry. As I was talking to the realtor, the subject of evictions came up, and I said I wasn't sure if I had one on my record, or not. She told me that if I did, it was a lost cause. "They" would see it, and decline my application. The size, location, and most of all my rental history were very upsetting.

Just before the New Year arrived, I had an idea. I checked the Franklin County Municipal Court website. This is where my eviction would have been, if I had one, and nothing came up. I called the realtor, and told her I was willing to take the gamble on my rental history, but that I wanted a different apartment. She said she had another available on the fifth floor of another building, but that it was occupied until February 1. It was higher, the rent was less, and all utilities were paid. I said I would take it sight unseen-providing, of course that my application was approved. I filled out the application and faxed it with my credit card number, and waited. I assumed it would be a couple days until I got a response, but to my surprise, the realtor called me within ninety minutes and said I had been approved. I had three days to get the deposit of 1 1/2 months rent to her in order to hold the apartment. Because of the timing, I had to borrow most of the deposit from my sister, who was more than happy to loan it to me-if it meant I would be moving out. It was repaid the following weekend.

The next hurdle was paying February's rent at the time I signed the lease. I pulled the money together, and had it by the last weekend in January, giving me two days to sign the lease. January 31, it was signed and sealed, but the keys were not delivered- the people living in the apartment were moving out that day.

Wednesday, Danny and I went and picked up the keys. The apartment was ready, and we were able to see it. Danny for the first time, I for the first real time. I had a chance to look into the apartment when I paid my deposit, but only for about a minute and a half.

Thursday, Charity's boyfriend allowed me to use his truck to move. This was a huge help in my quest for a new place. I had looked at hiring movers, but none were less than $350, and I don't have that much stuff to move.

I knew that the three snowstorms we had this winter would make moving tough. There were only a couple of parking spaces on the street, separated by mountains of snow. I was hoping to get lucky and find a space outside the door.

There was one! Danny and I loaded up the futon and took it uptown. The futon was the worst thing to move. It was definitely the biggest, most awkward thing. We parked in front of the building and unloaded it quikly. Back downtown for the second load, our luck had run out. After driving around the block several times, we finally found a space about a block away from the house. One box at a time went downstairs, out the door, down the block, and into the truck. When we got back uptown to the new place, our luck wasn't any better. A service truck had parked in front of the building, and the street was too narrow to park and unload. I asked the service man how long he would be there, and he said an hour and a half. I decided to go back downtown and feel sorry for my suddenly bad luck. Juas as I was about to pull away, the brake pedal sunk to the floor. This was not good.

I called Felipe, who owns the truck, and told him the problem. He came and met us, and we were able to get that load into the apartment. I feel terribly about the issue with the brakes. Car problems are never fun, but even less so when you have lent your car to someone else, and that's when the problem occurs. That ended our moving effort for that day, but we stayed in the new place that night. I was a little bit like camping.

One of the guys I work with offered his car on Saturday morning. I had to work Saturday afternoon, so I took him up on the offer to see how much we could get done. I met up with him around 7 AM that morning, and we began making trips uptown. It was no more than six trips, and no more than 2 1/2 hours until we had completed the task. Thanks to Felipe and Rich, this was a relatively painless move after all.

While Danny thinks the apartment is a little bit small, I love it. The area may turn out to be a little bit sketchy in the summertime, but hopefully everything will be just fine.