the earth is not a cold dead place.

Spring of 2008 was a season of anticipation. I was planning my move to San Francisco to save money on my commute. (ha.) My wounded heart, still raw, was beginning to heal and harden again. Harden in the good way... in a stronger way. I wanted to go into a world no one knew me so I could figure out who that even was any more. Sarah was preparing to leave the country, for the first time. For no planned amount of time only a few plane tickets bought ahead of time leaving her with a few "landing points". Left with no plan and a lot of fuckin courage. Jenna had just made one of the hardest decisions of her life when she broke off her engagement to Dominic. Jenna decision was not only leaving Dominic, she would have no choice but to leave her entire life behind - i.e. her job and friends. I often look at my two best friends to find reflections of myself. At this time we were in different boats all heading down the same river. Each one of us going forward independently of each other, for the first time ever. The following year and some months have changed the three of us, have distanced us from each other... and brought us back together. Though, I think we were all trying to achieve the same goal. We have tried desperately to regain a part of us we had all lost. There was an earlier transition phase where we were all changed, a few years back. I think it is from the times before that moment we three are wanting to live again. Three ghost girls reliving our pasts. (I am wondering now if the only people still reading/following this are Sarah and Jenna.) .... back on track.

Spring of 2008=anticipation. Summer of 2008=pull the trigger.

I easily found a place to live because of my fondness of the garden burger at People's Cafe and my even greater fondness of all the cute boys who worked and hung around there. (spoiler: these boys became the shrader/lost boys) I climbed up into Shrader House June 27th with jittery giggles, nervous shyness, two cats and no job. My first 6 weeks were supposed to be all the time I had in the house. I was eager to know my new roommates and the meet my new city. Quickly, I fell i love with the boys: Alex, Arseniy, and Dustin. The original roommates. Annie was still paying rent at this time but living at her boyfriends. Shrader House developed into more of a hostel. Between the roommates, friends in town for the weekend/week/month/summer and the scattering of couch crashers I had something like 15 roommates in those six weeks. The, at times, claustrophobic amount of people around me all the time, slingshot (slungshot? slingshotted? hahaha.) me into a social circle like none I had ever experienced before.

Sadie returned from visiting Maddie in South Africa. (catch up: i was subletting sadie's room) It was my time to leave these boys. By now I completely adored them all. I was having horrible luck finding a new place to live. Intimidated by sadie I feared her return. I felt like she would smell me on what was hers. For a reason I have never been able to understand, she loved me and MADE me stay in the house, promising we would make it work, somehow. For the next two month I shared the living room with Dustin. I built a nook out of the rounded window corner. Record player. Mattress. Books. Clothes in the hallway. I lived in the nook for two months.

Summer slowed to Autumn, San Francisco gets weird this time of year. Fewer and fewer friends are over all the time. Everyone stays indoors. In the Spring I felt so completely devastated all the time, but now there was a simple gladness within me. I fell deeper for all the new people in my life. By now all my roommates and practically roommates had become my family. More so than my own kin at times. Annie moved to New York in mid October freeing up the bedroom at the end of the hall. I swooped. The nook was comfortable, but it was a door and walls I yearned for.

Late fall something shifted. A darkness began to fill my heart. not a hateful one, but a hopeless one. I had now lived in SF for four months and the only friends I had made were the people I shared a floor and ceiling with, and a handful of people from work. I eventually stopped having fun going out all the time. I was notorious for pulling houdini acts. A text from alex once read: "you always bounce so cutty." Often.... no ... like every night... I would get bored and end up cabbing it home not saying bye to anyone. Mostly, just because I wanted to avoid telling someone who was having a blast that I was bored/tired and wanted to leave. I got sick of meeting the same drunk faces week after week and reintroducing myself.. knowing they won't remember me this time either. I began to feel inferior to all the hipness that is spewed all over the city. While observing the night life of San Francisco an aggravating frustration began to take hold. Most people I encountered didn't impress me... or fool me. The constant competition for attention pushed me inwards. I retreated from the scene preferring loneliness and cooking at home to all those shitty superficial people. (to clarify: shitty superficial people Do Not = anyone included in the shrader hostel collective)

However, I am not the kind that can get along alone in this world. I need other people. I need love. Which is why I was frustrated. I really wanted to like them all ... Seeing through their bullshit I could see well intentioned rad people. But everyone is caught up in It. whatever "It" is. I found "It" all very annoying. The love for my new family began to change. The newness, familiar. The novelty, old news. I spent the next two, maybe three, months withdrawn and depressed. I hid because I was disappointed in myself. 'I did not move here to be like this'. With the New Year, in my usual fashion, I used the reflective time of year to change some things. I started stepping out again. Saying - 'this is you life now. Find something you love about it.' I began to see the familiar attractions of SF, then like an ex-boyfriend calling me up to catch up on things, an opportunity to return to Body Time arose.

I had left the East bay not being able to look it in the eye. Everything reminded me of him. So, I ran to a distracting loveless city. By now I was over that silly boy, with only a few residual memories that brought on only nostalgic sadness. I felt confident in returning to Oakland. Late winter warmed to early Spring. My perspective on San Francisco changed to a more positive one. The energy, diversity and beauty of it all is surely why so many people cram into her. I found myself truly loving her, and on occasion I gripped even her hand as to not slip and fall again into my sorrow. I could appreciate the city more because of all the time I was spending with my "ex" (oakland). From a distance I valued and appreciated her. But I still felt awkward most of the time, uneasy at best.

Two months of commuting from Haight to Rockridge passed and I began toying with the idea of moving back to Oakland. ...maybe when Sarah returns form India... I would think. Right away I felt at home in Oakland. I reconnected with old friends and made a small handful of new ones. I cannot explain this to you unless you have lived, or spent a significant amount of time, on both sides of the Bay Bridge, so just know: they are different. There is a taste of hipness bile and shitty superficial people populate every corner of the world (unfortunately) but on the East side... there is tranquility to the air that I think makes people a little more chilled out about the hole I'm-So-Cool bullshit. A more sincere sense of community exists. So, i decided - move to where I feel comfortable, to where I do not retreat and hide, to where I can stretch out.

The idea of leaving Shrader House wet my eyes and sunk my heart deep into my chest cavity. I was spending less and less time with everyone, my days off usually had me heading eastbound as well. the following three months flew by. My roommates grew distant. I found myself feeling shy around them - alone in a crowded room - like they were all strangers again. I couldn't think of what to contribute to conversations. I started feeling left out of inside jokes. Maybe, we began this subconscious detachment because we all knew that one day I owuld be gone. Better get used to it first. Sadie, did not let go. Our friendship was (still is... but this story is in past tense) unique and tender. While our personality types and backgrounds were a bit opposite of each other, we found something within one another to really learn from. We were there for the other to lean on. I learned more form her than I ever thought I would. I continuously felt guilt for my lack of patience towards her, when all she really wanted was to help me find happiness. Sadie decided to move to Chicago to escape SF and to see new things in a place where no one knew her. The last night I saw her we hugged and cried. We both cried so hard we freaked out all of our friends.. and probably a few strangers entering the bar. I sobbed the whole walk home from her going away soiree. It was that night I realized Sadie was the truest friend I had made in the last year (it was a little over a week at this point from the time I moved into Shrader House a year before) and now she was flying away.

After Sadie left town the house dynamic changed again. I started to get a cold shoulder feeling from the boys. A week into feeling non existent I couldn't take it anymore. I let myself feel the sadness I had been holding back not wanting to admit. I didn't want to believe these people meant more to me than I did to them. That none of these friendships and bonds were real. Again.. it was part subconscious detachment and part everyone being wrapped up in their own shit too much (myself included) but those aren't good excuses and still, it fucking hurt. I did what anyone would do. I pushed them away as much as I felt they had pushed me. With one foot out the door I felt like I was now the Annie/"imaginary" roommate.. and my role of Wendy to the Lost Boys had already been replaced. I was excited to relocate to a place where I felt comfortable and could really settle into my surroundings, but I had many fears at the same time. I was anxious that when the time came for my other foot to leave Shrader these past 13 months would shrink in my memory. My few friendships would weaken. Mostly, that to the ones I loved I would become nothing more but a memory and name. My touches in the house had already begun to disappear. I didn't think I would leave on that sort of note. I have never believed in burning bridges. But keeping friendships alive is a two way road and I wasn't sure if either party would regularly travel it.

Obviously, a lot of these feeling were really brought on by my ultra-sensitivity and it was all really just a bunch of self-protective/defensive crap both sides were fronting. My last night at Shrader House was nothing but prefect. It was a Wednesday night which meant it was a West Addy night. West Addy (Western Addition) is a weekly party at Underground SF. The first week I moved in was the first week of West Addy. Actually, West Addy at the time was held only once a month. The DJs.. well Alex and Dustin of course. Alex stopped DJing for it a few months back. My last week at Shrader was the first time Dustin has not been the DJ... which, for me, was perfect. The three of us walked down to lower Haight.. brown bagged beers in hand. Because neither of them were "working" we got to kick it one last time. I remember this reminiscent conversation:
"awww. you guys! this is where it all started!" -K
"ha! i know! i remember that night. it was the first time you came out with all of us." -A
"Yeah!!!" -K
"and you got laid that night!" -A
(blush and smirk) -K
"by that vegan biker dude." -A
"hahahaha! yeah... awww matt. West Addy has always been good to me in that way." -K
We drank, danced, and laughed all night. I even made it until 2! ok.. I ended up leaving around 145... but I had good reason. West Addy has always been good to me.
The next morning I blew kisses to San Francisco and waved goodbye for now.

I don't have a real conclusion to my story because it ends with the present and I'm better at analyzing things that have already happened. (Aren't most people? I guess otherwise I would be psychic.) I have definitely left a piece of my heart in San Francisco and I am known to wear flowers in my hair... but for this time in my life Oaktown is exactly where I want to be. I have been forever changed by the experience. I still have not regained the part of me I lost years ago, but I am okay with that. Nothing is constant except change, and as long as I like who I am in the moment.. well then I think I've done all right.