A month ago, it was routine for me to wonder how closely the color of my bath would resemble my morning cup of tea, and whether I would emerge feeling more or less dirty. Life has changed since then. Obviously, it was important that I find myself a new location and start making money (which makes me squirm with displeasure, but what can you do? It's a workaday world.) So I decided on my most exciting, most exotic location yet... Pittsburgh.
Don't think I don't see that expression on your face. Before you settle into much-deserved Irene-mockage, hear me out. In my defense, Pittsburgh is a place I've never lived. It has plenty of job opportunities, especially with the student population shooed away for the summer. It's one of the safer, cleaner cities, and has a youth culture. Plus, it's not such a big city that I'd feel swallowed, like New York. But Pittsburgh's most important asset for me just graduated from law school- a roommate.
Everyone runs out of social juice at some point, don't they? For some people, it's like orange juice, and they always seem to have another bottle stashed away in a back room. For others, it might be more gauva or strawberry juice- in short supply, and quick to run out. After four years of living with strangers and making new friends every six months, I hope anyone's juice fridge would be empty. Not that I refuse to make any new friends in Pittsburgh- quite the opposite, in fact- but I need to spend time with at least one person who already knows all my stories and quirks, and who can tell when I'm indulging my flaws- and won't hesitate to swat me for it. I turned to Amy, my roomie from Kenyon, with whom I lived for three glorious semesters- semesters chockful of giant cookie runs, hot chocolate spiked with Bailey's, and impromptu dorm room dance parties.
Plus, she knows how to conjugate the verb "to defame." I trust you can see all the obvious advantages.
We haven't christened our sublet yet, but we're already very attached to it. The shower water is clear and always hot, all the appliances work, and there are no roosters as far as the ear can hear. The actual renters may return to find themselves barricaded out. My job for the summer shall be to mass allies for support in the inevitable Siege of the Shadyside Sublet. Watch the news in three months. I'll be the one in the dented helmet, shaking a machete.
The job search is officially on. Amy disappears routinely, being married to her Bar Exam preparations, and, being a fiesty wench, having a boy toy on the side. I figure it's good for me, because it forces me to look for jobs. Anything will do, possibly two anythings, depending on the hours and wages offered. If I know the patterns of my life at all, I'll be doing something totally new, for which I feel woefully unprepared. But I'm not too worried, because so far those situations seem to agree with me.
The biggest downfall of the Pittsburgh situation is the lack of a fuzzy critter in my life. At Skunk Hollow there was Ivanhoe, and at Bally Vaughan I could always rely on one of the two cats to park its pointedly-purring self on my chest or the keyboard, and rubbing a donkey's ears was an ever-present possibility as a short break from work. Here I depend on indulgent passers-by with dogs. Then there are those "Well that used to be a squirrel" moments...
More on life in Pittsburgh later. I'll do my best to make my existence here as exciting as it was in Africa. Shouldn't be too hard- it's Pittsburgh, after all..?
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