O r i•n z

Hey there,

Writing earlier today, I was thinking about writing you again. See, when I first heard about the possibility (and I realize it is still a *possibility* only) of three of the four members living together, I thought “cool! they’re gonna have so much fun!” And then my rational brain kicked in, and I decided to write this email. So there’s your topic sentence, I guess. 

I really think it will be totally awesome. I do, cause I know. But I also just went through the whole process of getting a damned place a nigh on two months ago. What I’ll say is that it required more teamwork, coordination, and time-investment than raising a child for that month. That’s this city, partly. Advice I would give is to divide the labor—take many many pictures and then show them to roommates later. Speaking of them, make sure you know what the hell you want, and what you’re willing to settle for. After awhile, we learned to just try and apply for every place we saw. If you can make a contact sheet with all your info on it, a lot of landlords appreciate that. Course, being where you are all this might not even matter and you’ll get one credit report and be on board. So I’ll talk more about roommates. 

I know Mickey had college roommates, and he has high standards of cleanliness and presentation. I think he’ll make a good roommate except for the neat-freak factor, which might cause an international incident or two. While you and Josh really haven’t had non-familial roommates before (wait… you haven’t, have you?) I think the aspect of moving in with friends has worked out for us up here in SF. It gives you a base. Kinda weird for us cause it’s a couple/couple setup. Knowing the homepie I don’t foresee any such even splits. What I do foresee… 

Well, gee, that’s the only part that really gets my imagination whirling is how things will fall into place. It was always my opinion, and I would guess a popular one, that our little group always balanced out between the four personalities. It wasn’t that easy for one person to be left out, there’s always at least one person you can talk to about whatever problem you have, hell we even seat evenly in cars. So having one person permanently removed outta-whacks things. It is, to some degree, like Mickey during college. We got used to that. But we could still visit when we wanted, it was reasonable. 

It would be harder now, but (now that I mention it) I’m planning on coming down to Socal starting by the 12th until I fly to Missouri on the 18th. Dunno what the situation would be then. I know that until then I’m probably a topic of conversation from time to time (just a guess :-P). Lots of catching up to do. I want to go to Burning Man this year, I remember talking about that with you. We were high and everyone thought it’d be AWESOME. But, we were high. Still like to go with slices if possible. 

If you don’t get an apartment together no one named “Billy” will think less of youse. It might work, but then again there’s issues. Josh wants two years. Mickey doesn’t know what to do with an almost-degree and I would assume has some student loans chasing him in his fever-dreams. Plus there’s the whole “when WILL the Homepie escape the confines of Coachella Valley altogether?” That’s more something I get to ask since you’re all happy as plums, from what seems to me. That’s ok for the moment. I know you haven’t forgotten me. This Pie has survived longer periods of separation and endured greater feats of dis-coordination. Hell, the lack of melodrama from my favorite friends has been a healthy and stable influence in my life, even if the influence is less than it once was. 

How that’s for a ramble? I have no earthly idea if this text will ever be useful to you but I liked writing it. Keeping in touch feels nice, and talking on the phone only goes so far. Thanks for the glot comment. You made my day even better than it already was. 


all that I am,
 -Billy

P.S. Oh yeah… oops. Cross out every instance referring to “apartment” with “house.” Cross out “landlord” and put “real estate agent.”

I hate to tell you, but it sounded to me like you weren’t snarky at all. So I gotta say I’m sorry, cause the last bit felt like honest soliciting of advice and I can’t help you beyond what you already know. As a matter of fact, it seems like you have it more or less right. Partly you wanna scram asap, partly you know that what time you have left there is precious too short. Shit. That’s exactly it. Exactly. So do what you’re doing, and you’ll be fine. For awhile might wish it were less simple but it ain’t.

So what can I say? What I’ve found makes me happy is meeting my own challenges and being content with that. It’s the only thing that ever has, besides the occassional long hot bath, amazing new artist discovery, bizarre once-in-a-lifetime experience, etc, etc. I thought for a little while I was going through another ‘ism’ phase, hedonism. I was gonna blog about it. But then I realized that, no, this is just the part of myself I’d been wanting to explore for a long time.

I set out to Australia to figure out how to interact with girls, with people in general, to get a cool apartment and expand my friends beyond the American. I wanted to improve myself in those ways cause I felt unsatisfied with my own behaivior. And my life was mostly a struggle, mostly worry, I had fun, but blew a whole load of money doing it. A year later: here I am, I have a French-Canadian friend in Spain, one on the Isle of Wight, and another who just came back from Cambodia. I have what I am convinced is one of the most enviable young-person’s apartment in the entire city. I have an awesome girlfriend with whom I go to incredibe events all the time. I don’t mean to brag, but I wanna say that I’m really enjoying my life right now. My parents want me to go back to school. But I don’t, so I won’t. And it’s been kind of weird figuring out that past a certain point of becoming stable and solvent and sustainable, you don’t have to work for it. I haven’t, lately. As Lynae so astutely put: “it’s really weird just being happy, isn’t it?”

So there’s me, right now. And I think that’s you, in the future. I don’t know what it’ll look like, obviously, and I think it’s good to fantasize like you have (sidenote: Cory Doctorow? Really? They let that man blather to students about Steampunk PDAs and copyrighted subway maps and how many robots can dance on the head of a pin? Bloglines, yes… student loans, no). I think just figuring what you want from yourself is the hardest part. Second hardest is sticking to it.

the best +1,
-Billy