how do you wrap up a nine-year-old kaleidoscope?

i'm physically drained & emotionally exhausted, after a much-needed cry. this afternoon, a long chapter (9 yrs!) of my life ended, as i closed up my old apt. one last time. moving sucks! in fact, on stress-level/healthy lifestyle inventories, it ranks right up there with things like divorce, unemployment & grief. i expected moving to be stressful, yet the sadness of leaving my old place caught me off-guard. today, i left work early to be present at the walk-through. i'm getting my full security deposit back (yay!). i had wondered about it, since there's new management (from the condo-conversion). but this woman was actually really nice and said she's still learning the ropes of property management. she was impressed with how impeccably clean my unit was, especially after nine years!

when we were done, she went back to her office, and told me to take as much time as i needed to linger and reminisce, before turning in the keys. so i spent some time just standing out on my balcony appreciating the view as my eyes got teary. i walked through each room once more and stood a few moments, running my fingers along the walls.

when i arrived in '97, i had no idea that a unique & long chapter of my life had begun. i assumed I'd stay for 2-3 yrs at most, and then high-tail it to boston. but life got in the way, and my burning desire to get to beantown faded. (who needs cold weather anyway?). for a while i felt stuck, because my health failed. words can't do justice to everything that space came to represent for me. it provided shelter, a safe-haven, and a space i could call mine, esp. when i was so sick and could have so easily lost my autonomy or independence. it was a place where i contemplated, planned & dreamed. at one point, when i was too sick to work, i had to get a little bit of parental help to hold on to that space. they gladly did it b/c they readily saw how important it was to me to not lose my independence the way so many young people do when faced with illness or disability. i am forever grateful.

it's like there's a kaleidoscope of nine years of memories lingering in those apartment walls: late nights sitting at my old mac pecking away at the keyboard on a dial-up connection. staying up into the wee hours to revise my master's thesis, despite painful joints & the uncomfortable late-spring Virginia humidity seeping into my apartment . happy times when my family and friends visited. telephone arguments & temper flares whose details are long-forgotten, but whose memories are etched into the walls along with the good times.

there's that late night heart-to-heart with my mom circa 2001-02, at the height of my despair over rheumatologic woes & steroid-induced weight gain. it's where i helped nurse my dad back to health when my parents stayed w/me immediately after his '03 heart valve replacement. i remember sitting in my living room crying one fall afternoon in 2003, wondering if a job offer would come through�and then the phone ringing minutes later with an interview offer. and sitting there a week later and getting my current job offer. or lying in the light of the late afternoon sun on that early march day this year, when my stanford letter came in the mail. it's where i lay awake in bed, wondering if i'd get into UVA. or sat at my desk in april, realizing the awesomeness of the east coast-west coast decision that lay before me.

more than anything, it was home for nine special years that empowered me & allowed (if not forced) growth in a way most young adults don't expect. that, combined with the fact that the condo-conversion forced most renters out, made this move especially emotional. for one last time this afternoon, i locked up #411, probably forever. but bigger, better things await.