Settling in.

There's nothing like looking through the memory card of my camera to remind me how little I've been posting lately. I have homecoming pictures, camping pictures, painting pictures, packing pictures, and a few random Boogaloo pictures all begging to have something done with them. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately) I'm a little to full of the present to revisit the past. I'm learning that moving is more than packing and unpacking. It's reestablishing ones' self, and that's just not easy.

The whirlwind is largely over. All of our deadlines have come and gone. Our furniture is all in place, and our garage is largely empty of boxes. Annika's toys are all assembled. We have even hung some pictures on the walls.

Still, there are so many things that are out of place: shelves that aren't up, lamps with no bulbs, lightswitches that pertain to that mystery outlet (you know the kind), boxes of books, and bags of screws and other hardware with no perceivable purpose. We now have more windows, so we need more curtains. We have more sinks, so we need more soap dispensers. We have more space, so we need more livingroom furniture. Now there's a broadening experience. We, who still have our posters from college decorating our walls, are now the proud owners of two recliner rockers and two more bookcases. We are looking for something that might pass as a couch.But the biggest adjustment, I think, is learning to live in an apartment complex again, and a complex with no binding ties. In college, we lived in apartments, but we all went to class together. In the military, we lived in apartments, but we had a common experience to keep us interested in each other. This is just a plain old apartment complex, and now I know the truth. An apartment complex is the only place where you can hear a person through the wall, but you don't talk to them in the street.

Maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration. I've been here two weeks, and I know the names of two people outside of the leasing office staff. These people are my neighbors on each side of me, and I only know the name of my right hand neighbor because I had to ask her permission to block her driveway for an afternoon. She helped me unload my trailer, and we shared lifestories in about five minutes, but I hadn't said ,"Hey, by the way, . . ." as she was leaving, I wouldn't have gotten her name. Seth got the name of the lefthand neighbor for me. He thinks I should pop over and arrange a playdate. They both have kids the same age as mine, but we never seem to run into each other.

That's what I don't get about this place. I know people get to know each other. I've heard them talking outside the window. But it seems like there's no crossdwelling intercourse on a daily basis. There was no welcome wagon, no neighborly curiousity, no "Hey, I see you have a toddler. Would you like to come over and play?" For all this is called a "community," it doesn't feel like one. I have actually introduced myself to people I've met in the park (after the second or third meeting), and they wouldn't tell me their names in return. They looked at me like I was odd for bringing the subject up. It seems to me that when people live this close together, they should know something about each other. Like the old Papiamento saying goes, get to know your neighbors. If you hurt yourself, they're the ones you're going to call first.