Moving House (8)

One last push and I am there.

I'm knackered. Been cleaning this place in an effort to recover the deposit I put down three years ago one rainy morning in my landlord's office outside Northampton, but I'm reaching the point where I don't care anymore. I'm a slob, kiddies; it's driving me nuts--ripping a hole in my brain--trying to look at this place the way a pristine, upright ex-Army man like my landlord would look at it. Let him keep the money if he worries about dust gremlins between the floorboards. He'll probably keep it anyway.

I've been pretty melancholy (my worst vice) for a few weeks as the moment of the move approached--been thinking about all the good things that happened here, what I gained and then lost between moving in and moving out. The memories are so good, so real, so close. But fuck it, they are memories.

What happens in the future is what happens; but dwelling on the past is pointless and masochistic. I've had some of the highest times of my life between these walls, as well as some of the lowest. Maybe I'll have a few high times in the new place as well. I have never liked the poignantly tragic, defeated odour that affirmations like that give off, but that's how it is. Life marches on, and if you're lucky and you can find enough arse in your britches to deal with the dead and the living, some of what you experience can be pretty damn nice.

That's enough time standing over the grave of the past looking in it for answers.

A few emails to write, then I'm unplugging the computer and packing it for the move.

I expect to be back online in a couple of days. Check back Friday or Saturday. In the meantime why don't you visit Norbert Blei's site (www.norbertblei.com ) if you haven't done so before, and acquaint yourself with the work of America's greatest living writer. It'll stimulate your mind and your spirit in a way that I never could.