moving apartments makes me really sad

i said it was brat summer, didn't i?

i’ve always had difficulty moving, i first realized this about myself when i was in my parent’s car driving up to my freshman year dorm, with every building that passed my heart beat a little quicker and dread slowly seeped into every pore of my body. every year since then even when i was excited to leave whatever cramped living situation i’ve was in, the weeks leading up to move out made me feel deeply nostalgic and mourn the life i had barely being able to close my dresser drawers.

i’m moving apartments this week, and everyone seems to be confused as to why i am having such a hard time stomaching it. the apartment i am moving into came to me in nothing short of a new york fairy tale (thank you

Nikole Lubov Naloy

for passing it down, i promise to leave it to another downtown substack girl <3). what i struggle to articulate is that the excitement for something new has no impact on the loss of something that was great, even if deep down you’re ready for the change.

i procrastinated packing my apartment (you only REALLY need one day), i think because i was anxious about seeing it stripped bear. i dreading taking down the photos of my grandmother and the magnets on my fridge and discarding the disco ball every 22-year-old hangs in their bedroom that i still haven’t gotten rid of. i took a break in the afternoon after almost shattering a mirror to take a walk, i was about to cross into st marks in a bit of a daze when i saw angelina’s beaming face cut through my fuzziness clad in her summer uniform of a tank top, low rise mini skirt and boots. running into her around the corner of my apartment of the past 2 years felt slightly poetic, i’m moving into angelina’s building….(!!!!) and seeing a reminder of my future in the place i am moving from had that special effect of wrapping up a coincidence in the shiny film of fate. we gabbed and hugged goodbye still grinning at the fortuity of it all. a mere minutes after that i crossed 14th street and saw my friend natalia in the distance, as soon as we recognized each other our mouths hung open and we embraced. we are what i like to call biannual friends, we usually get a drink or dinner 2x a year and talk about books and fashion and dating. we chatted about what we were reading (both of us are in the middle of all fours by miranda july) and then departed exchanging tentative plans that hung limp in the air. as i walked home i realized- the first time i met natalia was sitting on a bench in stuytown the day before i moved from my first apartment to the one i am about to leave. we initially started chatting because we were both reading the same book, i remember telling her how excited i was to live in the east village but comparatively how sad i felt to be closing a chapter- which is exactly how i felt today. the b2b coincidences made my breathing return to that familiar shallow exhale and my hand start to subtly shake as i unlocked my front door for one of the last times. maybe these interactions were a byproduct of constantly seeing everyone you know out on the streets of new york, maybe it was a sign from the universe screaming “YOU ARE GOING TO BE OKAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”.

later that night i was lying exhausted on my bed after packing my last box (dramatic!) and refreshed my substack notifications to see that a dear reader had gone back through my archives and restacked the below quote i wrote almost a year ago. i think one of the strangest sensations is being comforted by the interiority of an unfamiliar version of yourself when you didn’t know you needed it.

“i struggle with the duality that lives in an inherent optimistic confidence in the future coupled with anxiety spinning from how time moves parallelly incomprehensibly rapid and slow at the exact same time.”

usually, i can try to ignore change and focus on putting one foot in front of the other but events like graduations and birthdays and new year’s eve and the passing of seasons and moving apartments fabricates change in a tangible way that feels inescapable to face. i’m forced think about the time accumulated in a specific chunk of my life, the relationships that have been built and the ones i’ve left to decay, the phone calls to my parents, the failed attempt to hang some shelves that resulted in a giant hole in the wall, the books by my bed that were picked up by exes, countless facetime debriefs with friends after a night out ripe with gossip, good clothes and bad clothes, zoom presentations at work that were done from my kitchen counter…. moving is a physical manifestation of me making a choice, which i find paralyzing all the time. i will never forget the brutal therapist who casually told me, “you can act like the most confident person the room but if you do not have the conviction to make a decision resulting in change without trusting yourself, it’s really all just fake”. she earned her $150 that day.

i admire anyone who casually says, “i love change!!” like it’s the simplest thing in the world… it’s a lot easier to be optimistic when the future is recognizable. maybe i’m so emotional about leaving this place because i’m proud of a lot of things happened here. i’m proud of the friendships i’ve made, the uncomfortable situations i’ve put myself in, the confrontations i faced instead of sinking away, this substack that i started from my couch on a whim one random sunday, the weight i’ve gained, the scarf i (half) knitted, the plans i’ve had the guts to say “no” to and the plans i’ve had the guts to say “yes” to. i’ll miss that apartment and i’ll miss that time in my life, i’ll miss hearing my roommate’s infectious laugh bounce off our walls, i’ll definitely miss the cheaper rent. i won’t miss the mice.

this basically was an anxiety fueled spiral… thank you for reading!!!!!!!! the best is yet to come :)

i didn’t publish a dear angel cake this week because i am clearly ~overwhelmed~ but this week we’re sooooooo back. (email angelcake@substack.com with your advice submission).

next sunday i’ll write something fun and light i promise.

xoxoxoxo