reasons i did not move to new orleans

reasons i did not move to new orleans:
1.) ghosts
2.) cockroaches

so last i wrote, i mentioned the ghost that i said lived in my shotgun. i really didn't believe it. logically, i knew it was just the people next door. sometimes i would hear weird noises in the kitchen when my roommate wasn't home. they made me a little nervous, but since i am still in a new place, i convinced myself that it wasn't anything to be concerned with. i'm not just used to the house yet.

until today. i mean maybe it's nothing. maybe it's just the house resettling, since my landlord has been working on balancing it. today while i was getting ready in the morning, chrissy came into my room. "did you feel that?" she asked. i shook my head. she was laying on her bed reading, and something shook her. obviously it wasn't an earthquake...but what was it? it happened again tonight after i went into the kitchen. she said she felt it again while i was in the kitchen and she was in the living room. strange.

ghosts, mildly disturbing. ghosts i feel like i can deal with. you know, the power of prayer, the priest coming and blessing the house, and that.

but cockroaches. SERIOUSLY.

two nights ago we were watching a movie, and this big black blob scuttles across the floor. the sucker was about an inch and a half long, with wings and antennae. i screamed and jumped on the couch, and chrissy sat in the chair, completely frozen. there were two, scurrying around by the fireplace and tv. i know cockroaches are cockroaches, but THESE cockroaches fly. FLY.

my biggest fear about the cockroaches comes from the fact that my bed is a futon that is on the ground. WHERE THE COCKROACHES ARE. while standing on the couch, i called my friend bj and asked what to do. "if i try to kill it, will it fly at me?" i asked. he recommended not hunting it out. but after putting on my socks and shoes (literally) i managed to kill one with the rubber mallet (i think it was already dead). after i went to bed, i dreamed terrible dreams. every time i threw back the covers on my bed, i found more cockroaches.

the next day chrissy went out and bought roach motels and boric acid which she put along the cracks in the walls. all was well. i felt safe at night, and slept better than i had for the last few nights.

but tonight it was full out war. i'm in the living room, filling out some paperwork, and i hear screaming coming from chrissy's room. i'm thinking it's the ghost again. NO. two huge disgusting cockroaches. i grabbed the mallet and smashed the hell out of the one in the kitchen. as i flushed it down the toilet, the second roach crawled down the wall and underneath chrissy's shoe. in a team effort, she lifted the shoe and i smashed it. the third one was waiting for me in the kitchen.

i can only imagine what they neighbors were thinking. we were screaming, cursing, there were almost tears, and lots of pounding as i beat the roaches into pieces.

i almost don't want to go to bed. they come out when it's dark, roaches and ghosts.

So the first week is over. i really don't know where to begin or how to describe how i feel about it so far. i know there are going to be so many challenges, and i keep wondering how i am going to have time for any of the things i need to do. i wouldn't say i'm scared. i would say i'm tense.

in my last semester at college, i realized that when i'm tense, i lock my jaw up and clench my teeth. i think that it is a relatively new phenomenon because i don't ever remember doing it during The Worst Fall Ever. my jaw gets tight, and my teeth actually ache. most of the time i don't realize how tight it is until i open my mouth wide, and stretch the muscles. it's strange(mom, please don't get worried and pick up the phone to call me and tell me i need a doctor.).

and i've been having dreams again. terrible nightmares, actually. i can't remember what happens in them. the strangest part, and this has never happened before, is that i always know that in each dream, i know it's a dream. i'm being chased or i'm encountering something Evil, and just when it becomes as possibly horrible as my sleeping imagination can create, i'm saved by my level-headedness. in the middle of the dream i say to myself something like, "oh this is just a dream. don't worry. just wake up right now." and i do. sometimes i'm sweating, and sometimes it takes a moment to figure out where i am. usually i want to pick up the phone and call someone.

my neighbor told me that the ghosts don't like shotgun houses, so i should be safe. i'm not an avid believer in ghosts, but sometimes i can't help but wonder about them. the ceilings are so high, and my bed is on the floor. what's going on in and all that space between? it doesn't help that i can hear the footsteps in the hallway of the adjacent shotgun. they have a little dog that runs up and down the hallway, his nails scratching on the hardwood. sometimes i can't believe that the footsteps belong to jasmine and darrell or the dog. they have an other-worldly sound to them.

it's my imagination that is continually getting the best of me. when i'm out, i'm in a constant panic that i didn't lock the door. if i go out and come back after dark, i'm always afraid that there's someone home. it's not true. most of the crime that occurs in this city is, as one of my bosses put it, "crime committers against crime committers." that's a nice way to put it. yeah.

the enemy isn't a ghost or a thief or any of those obstacles that my active imagination throws in my path. combatting your own imagination and your fears is a hard thing to do. i'm not sure what the solution is, but it can be done i'm sure.

first things first: i got the gecko out of my house, albeit it changed several different colors before i got rid of it. apparently geckos are the least of my worries here; i hear the flying cockroaches are really something to look forward to. great.

first and second days of training went relatively well. they were slightly overwhelming. we spent two hours going over how to live on a budget. not only was it terrifying, but by the time we were done, my eyeballs were literally dollar signs.

all my co-workers seem really nice, but i really get along with the people who are going to be at my site. that's a huge plus. the supervisors seem pretty cool, too.

getting around on my bike is going well for the most part. my speed keeps getting slower and slower. everything is really flat here, which is really nice, minus the big bridge that goes over the interstate. every time i think of it, my muscles go weak. at the bottom of the hill, i'm certain i'll never make it up. somehow i'll manage, but i'm glad today was my last day having to ride up.

i don't think i'd be quite so tired this early in the week if i hadn't gotten lost on my bike on sunday. planning ahead, i decided to ride my bike to our training site, just so i'd have an idea of how long it would take. it's just less than four miles, so i figured an easy twenty minutes at a leisurely pace. twenty minutes turned into a dragged out almost two hour bike ride. the streets aren't straight here, and i had much less of an idea of where i was going than i thought. i finally got to the site by the grace of God. i just prayed i could find a direct route home. i did, and it wasn't so bad. now it only takes me about twenty minutes.

besides the hill, the only other problem with biking is the fact that the roads are certainly not in top condition. the water damage from katrina, i'm sure played a large part of the problem, however because the city is not on solid ground, the ground often shifts. this causes houses and buildings to sag or lean to one side. just the other day, my landlord was saying how they'd have to prop up one side of our house. the roads are horrible. they sag, there's awful potholes, and patches that just don't match.

inspite of this, i really am liking riding my bike so far. i'm sure i won't be saying that the first day it rains, but at least both of the other americorps at my site have cars, and i'm right by the streetcar.

it's time to go eat dinner and crack a bottle of (cheap) champagne with my roommate to celebrate the fact that our hosue is almost in order. hurrah!

settler

it will suffice to say i am quite lazy about unpacking.
and nothing more needs to be said about that.

yesterday i called one of my co-workers who also hails from the midwest. she, her boyfriend, and her friend, and i all went out to catch a movie at this great little neighborhood theatre. an wrinkly and shaky old man took our tickets as he welcomed us to the theatre. the onscreen dancing vintage box of popcorn and large soda welcomed us to the theatre, and we all settled and waited for our feature presentation to start. and an hour into the show, just as burn after reading was about to reach the most climatic part of the movie, the power went out. we waited for an hour, hoping that the film would recover, but, alas it did not. so we settled for margaritas.

i went to church this morning at the methodist church up the street. never have i felt so welcome in a church. there was no sense of church hierarcy or bureaucracy, nothing but friendly handshakes, hugs, and peace-be-with-you's. the music was good, and the church was a mix of old, young, black, white, and hispanic. they were having an activities fair or something, to display all the different ministries that the church has going on. this was quite convenient for me, since i'm new to the block and looking for some social outlets. i also met some other americorps members. it seemed pretty cool.

after i came home and made brunch for myself, and had a good talk with an old friend. there are few people in life you can really say have seen you at your best, worst, and most ugly. this friend has seen me in everyone of those conditions, and he never fails to let me forget it. today he caught me at one of those "worst" moments.

now i'm not afraid of much. i can deal with all kinds of bugs (with a small exception to mississippi's flying love bugs) and i know how to deal with mice. but in the midwest, we don't have geckos. those little buggers are quick and they change color, and they are not something i care to encounter in my home. my dad had warned me when he left that there might be one in the house, but in the midst of settling in, i'd completely forgotten. until today when i saw it while i was on the phone. "oh come on, molly," my friend said. "you're fine, you're not afraid of that are you?"

you tell me what i'm supposed to do with a gecko? it runs faster than i can, and swatting at it with a broom will only prove to be unsuccessful, and only end with the gecko hiding out under my couch. (trust me- i tried.)

so now we have a third roommate. and the little bastard isn't even paying rent.

i rented a shotgun?

i have a place to live. now life can go on as normal. living in a hotel and having someone make your bed and change your towels every day is nice, but valet parking is not all it's cracked up to be.

the apartment hunt ended with some disappointment. the place i had dreamed of was a sunny, spacious, second story. it was beautiful and had the best closet i have ever seen. the room was huge. AND it came with a puppy sans responsibility since it did not belong to me. but alas, the girl was as indecisive as i am, and couldn't make a decision. thankfully, however, that did not leave me out on the street.

i ended up with my second choice in a shotgun house. it's a long, relatively narrow apartment that shares a front porch with another similarly styled apartment, the two of them making up one house. the only door that has any real use in the apartment besides the front and back doors, is the bathroom. it is truly the only place where you can find any privacy because to get from the front door to the kitchen, you have to walk through each successive room. my roommate has also just moved here, so the house is in a messy dissarray. when everything is in order, you will enter in the living room, walk through the dining room, my bedroom, her bedroom, and end in the kitchen. i'm not complaining because she's giving me a great deal.

from my interaction with a few loclas, shotgun houses have quite historic roots. one person told me that the shotgun house earned its name because a person could stand at the front door, shoot a gun, and the bullet would go straight out the back door. he continued saying that the style is based on ancient african style houses, and that by opening both the front and back doors, the breeze is more able to blow through the house. the second person told me that the style was developed during the civil war to provide safety to the tenants. should someone shoot through the front door, the people inside could duck behind the wall for protection.

i will have to relearn how to contain my mess in a closet. it will simply not do to have someone walking through my messy room every day. to parents with messy children: this is a solution to all your problems with laundry on the floor. when it is a matter of practicality, there's no arguing that it has to be done.

voodoo country, i guess

i'm in new orleans now. the only way things could improve any would be if i could actually get an apartment. whatever, small details. apartment hunting has been going well. i've checked out 5 places.

today i encountered a voodoo gypsy woman.

she called me last night about my craiglist apartment man. in 15 minutes, she managed to tell me everything about herself, and very little about the apartment. i knew this much: that for $450 a month, i would have a room with utilities in a decent neighborhood, with food because gypsy-woman is a chef for a restaurant as well as privately for a family....in addition to being a telemarketer, a belly-dance instructor, and hairdresser. it was a no-brainer: i had to go check it out.

she answered the door and held her finger up, pausing me from saying anything because she was in the middle of a telemarketing sale. she pointed at the couch for us to sit down, so we did. i knew she had several pets, and she told me what she had over the phone. the menagerie of ferrets, guinea pigs, cat, some mysterious animal that made a lot of noise, and her "wolf" (whatever, it was a german shepherd mix.) didn't bother me. the snake did. it stared at me and slithered in its cage. because i'm petrified of snakes, i shifted my gaze.

right to the coffin that sat propped up against the wall in the living room.

swords hung from every wall in the apartment. in the middle of the coffee table was a long wooden bowl, on top of which rested the largest sword of all, and in which lay three crystals. voodoo magic? gypsy magic? i can only begin to guess. i looked for crystal balls and tarot cards, but i saw none. i'm sure if i crossed her palm with silver, she would have told me my fortune.

the smells coming from the kitchen were delicious, and after she hung up the phone, she told me about the place. she talked fast, and she talked loud, and she pulled her long black hair off her back and twisted it around itself. her skin was a dark olive color and her eyes were almost black. she had a big smile, and a kind face. she was friendly in the most open way, not afraid to say what she was thinking, but so stuck on being friendly that she didn't know how to ask questions. her teeth protruded from her thin lips, like a horse's. she looked gypsy. and she continually referenced her gypsy heritage, as if she thought we would forget. the swords hanging literally over our head made that impossible.

and somehow, before we had even gotten to the logistics about the apartment, she brought up the coffin, still tilting ominously against the wall. my dad politely pressed her for more information. she's a vampire novelist, she says. the coffin was used at her book signing. not only is it a great conversation piece, but she uses it as a way to tell people about her writing. her friends, insist that she is too quiet about her writing succeses, and believe that she should talk more about them. and apparently, it works. i would say that having your coffin sitting in your living room is a silent motivator.

in any case, as soon as i could catch a word in edgewise (which we didn't really, the telemarketer phone line rang), i ski-dooed right out of there. it seems obvious that i wouldn't have even considered living with her. but you would be wrong to think that. i didn't take the apartment, but i thought seriously about it, mostly because my writer's instinct knew there would be great material. ok, the free food...who am i kidding.

the hunt continues. i guess i might have a place, and have a fall back. but until i unpack my u-haul, i live with the haunt that someone will drive off with my uhaul trailer and i will never again see my precious antiques.