The ‘good’ thing about bad things is that they can put your life into perspective. For example, this time last week we had no hot water in the house. It put into perspective how much I like hot running water. And then it was discovered that the reason there was no hot water was because of a burst pipe under my bedroom floor. That put into perspective how much I liked living in an apartment that did not have a river running underneath its floorboards.
All these revelations are greater, but I get it, okay, universe? I think I’ve gotten enough perspective for a little while.
So I had to haul all of my furniture out of my bedroom and into the living room so the plumbers could rip up my floor. In the meantime I needed a place to stay and it just so happened that the basement apartment across the way had opened up.
We’ve all watched horror movies and shouted advice at the screen (“Don’t go in there, you idiot!”). We’ve all seen the movie where the happy family stays in the obviously haunted house while we roll our eyes and mutter “I would just leave.” I’ve since gained sympathy for ghost story characters. I can now see why someone might stay in a haunted house: sometimes you just have no other place to go.
Not that I think the other basement apartment is haunted. It’s just a little weird. It’s gone through numerous tenants in the last five years: I cleaned out the mailbox and found letters addressed to five different people. Strange to think that, thanks to my temporary stay here, I’ve now been added to the roll call.
But whatever, the apartment is nice enough and even slightly bigger than the one I was in before. But then, once I had kinda sorta settled into my temporary refuge, I find out that one of my best friends was in the hospital. Screw perspective, that just sucks.
Because of my crazy week I’ve done very little writing and I’ve been really slacking off when it comes to NaNo. But weirdly enough I received some good news- two story acceptances in a week! That just defies the odds to a mindboggling degree. Obviously I was thrilled, but the mix of great news with really crappy news left me feeling punch drunk. But time for perspective: my friend is healing quickly, I have a dry place to live, and I have two stories that are going to be published. Things could be much, much worse.