growing pains
no one could have prepared me for the grief associated with moving out of our first apartment as a couple. adam and i moved to colorado in one year after we started dating. in 2022, we settled into a cozy one-bedroom apartment in arvada. we got lucky with that place. i knew nothing about the area when i chose it (almost randomly) from my apartment spreadsheet which compared things like cost, safety, and access to public transportation. all i could tell you about our new residence before we moved there was that it was relatively cheap and close to the G line, which i could take to work downtown. when we finally pulled up after three days of driving in our rusty ford five hundred, packed to the brim with clothes, snacks, and my two beloved spider plants, the two of us exhaled 1,500 miles worth of anxiety. we were home.
i realized pretty quickly that our location was not ideal as far as really immersing ourselves in the city of denver. while we could ride the train downtown, we were isolated from many of my coworkers’ haunts. places they frequented nightly were a 25 to 40 minute drive for us. although i was bummed about my self-imposed isolation on some nights, mostly i reveled in it. i loved our little neighborhood bubble. i felt safe and alone and never lonely. but when the bubble finally popped, when we had to admit that our camping gear alone required more than 600 sq ft of space and our respective commutes were draining us, we picked up and started again.
i didn’t have a lot of time to grieve our first apartment while we were there. i was already grieving my great aunt, who had passed in august. i couldn’t handle any more sadness. but we’ve been in the new place for almost a month now. i’m sure our previous residence has been occupied by another couple, or maybe two friends, or a single man with a dog. so it’s time for me to relinquish the spiritual hold i have on that place and be at peace with the present.
i have nowhere else to put these observations, so here are all the things i miss about our previous apartment:
one day, a yellow butterfly appeared in our courtyard. every morning i sat on the balcony to read and drink my coffee, and every morning the yellow butterfly floated around, playing on the gusts of air which carried her from the top floor down to the pool and back up again. no one seemed to offer her anything to make her stay, yet she still wanted to be there. she was the best part of my morning.
the french lesbian couple and their two dogs, one of whom they wheeled around in a cart because he was partially paralyzed. i often saw them bring the dogs outside to use the bathroom. the dog with the limp would stay close to his cart, do his business quickly, and then stare longingly at his moms until they made him cozy again.
the view of the mountains from our balcony. i’ll insert a picture because i don’t think my description could do them any justice. people who don’t live in denver often imagine it as a “mountain town,” but the city itself is alarmingly flat. this is the great plains to the east of the rockies. and from many places in denver, the mountains aren’t even visible. you have no idea where you are until you get on I-70 and drive west. but i never wondered where i was because i saw my beloved mountains every day.
the yellow butterfly must love this view this past spring, i started seeing bunnies outside of our building. as i walked from the train station to our apartment every night, the bunnies lined my path and guided me home. sometimes i would see five or six of them at a time. i’ve always interpreted seeing rabbits to mean good luck, and i was grateful for my fluffy protectors.
the dogs who sat on outdoor couches on balconies and barked at each other. they couldn’t see one another, as one of the dogs lived directly above the other, but they could hear (and probably smell) their potential playmate. the two often barked incessantly, trying and failing to use echolocation to bring them together. it sounds kind of sad when i write it out, but it was mostly hilarious two watch them chase their own tails for five minutes before giving up and falling asleep on their beds.
i know i said earlier that my commute had exhausted me, and to some extent that is true, but i also miss my peaceful 18 minutes on the train. i used this time to listen to audiobooks, mostly of the spiritual or self-development nature, so i associate that time with feelings of hope, gratitude, and excitement. many of my ideas for this substack came to me during that commute.
our tiny ikea loveseat, which after two years had been squished in the middle so that when adam and i sat on either cushion, we fell towards each other and were “forced” to cuddle even when we didn’t mean to.
i miss the walls that enveloped us as we built our life together. we learned so much about each other in the early months - which meals we enjoyed most, where to go when we wanted alone time, and how to communicate when one of us felt our needs weren’t being met by the other. that apartment held us as we laughed together, cried together, and loved each other more than either of us thought possible.
when i reflect on the past two years of my life, the resonant feeling is that of hope. it was the beginning of everything - this blog, my business, my post-grad independence, and my blossoming relationship with adam. i want to end this post on a hopeful note, because i think my old apartment would like that, so here are the things i love about our new place:
the sunlight filtering through the blinds in the kitchen as i make my coffee in the morning.
our faux fireplace mantle which we decorated with battery-operated candles that make the room feel cozy and a bit spooky.
the intricate molding around every doorframe. the details in this old house are unique and charming, so vastly different from the new-build, millennial greige vibe of our previous residence.
the new house’s proximity to multiple parks and lakes, where a water sign girl can feel relaxed for once in this desert.
little tiny downtown denver in the background our upstairs neighbor’s dogs - bones and deggy - who we can watch from the back window when they get the zoomies and jump over each other.
our storage room, where we can hide literally alllll of the junk that used to take up space in our living room. we covered the doorway with a curtain so the camping chairs, tools, coolers, and random boxes are both out of sight and out of mind.
the artwork on our walls - chosen carefully to fit our color scheme and make sure future guests know that we’re edgy
art by eniko eged, candle arrangement by me the daybed in what was meant to be a dining room, but is now a guest room/office/yoga studio/future warehouse for the journals. i went to DC a few weeks ago and told my friends all about the extra space we had for them if they ever wanted to visit (hint hint wink wink). by the end of the trip, they were so sick of my talking about the fucking daybed that i think i scared them away from colorado forever. but on the other hand, we did use it to convince my little brother to sleepover on sunday. i’ll take a win where i can get it.
when i was younger, between the ages of nine and twelve, my thighs would being to ache, unprompted and at random times throughout the day. each time it happened, my mom waved it off, “growing pains.” now, i ache in other ways. i lie on my back in the grass in a nearby park and my heart yearns for the days of picnicking on the national mall with my friends. i step on a crunchy leaf and wish i could transport home to pennsylvania, where the seasons transition gracefully. i watch a squirrel scurry up a tree and i miss the bunnies who visited the backyard of an apartment building where i used to live, but never will again. we keep growing, despite the heavy pull of nostalgia. we accumulate memories and details of our lives like leaves in a pool. to minimize the growing pains, sometimes we have to clear it out.
xx,
rachel