Lately, instead of living in one place, I’ve been shuffling between my apartment in Manhattan and my dad’s house in the upstate suburbs. I like this arrangement for a variety of reasons. I don’t have laundry in the city, and I can wash my clothes for free when I go home. I miss the fresh air and can drive around the towns along the river with the windows down, letting the breeze hit my face. I like spending time with my dad, and we often go to my favorite restaurant together when I’m there.
I go up a weekend or two every month. Sometimes I stay a couple of days, but usually it works out that I can stay upwards of a week. My aunt chastises me, telling me I shouldn’t be paying rent on a city apartment if I’m just going to escape upstate all the time. But I don’t mind. I like the duality of having both.
This desire, for duality, for movement, perhaps by some people’s definitions, for chaos, has been one that has followed me throughout my adult life. For a while, I kept thinking it would stop at some undetermined point. Like if I just kept running around, I’d eventually find whatever I was looking for and the urge to be somewhere else would suddenly stop.
At different points in my life, when I’ve been with different men who I can see a future with, I’ve slowed my roll, stayed in the city we live in, tried to find joy in the stability of a serious relationship and a future that matches what I’ve been told to want. But each time I’ve started to settle down, the universe intervenes, the men run away, and I’m left once again to my life on the road.
If this were a more philosophical discussion, I might try to psychoanalyze the kinds of men I’m often with, and the ways in which I create self-fulfilling prophecies to land myself back in the lifestyle I feel most comfortable. But it’s not.
At some point in my early twenties, I decided I’d get a cat to settle myself. With a cat, I couldn’t go away every weekend. I’d need to plant roots, stay home, and care for Louis.
Instead, I got cat sitters (they’re fairly easy to find), or started taking him upstate to visit my dad while I traveled, or, primarily, I just started traveling around WITH the cat. He’s driven across the country three times and lived in five states. He regularly takes the subway and makes transfers in Times Square. Last time we rode the Metro North, he made friends with another traveling cat and they meowed at each other across the aisle the entire ride back to Manhattan.
For now, I’ve stopped trying to fight who I am and instead just begun to embrace the nuances of a life lived in many places. When I want to go upstate, I go. When I want to travel to another country, I go. When I want to spend a quiet evening in my apartment, I stay. There’s a time and a season for everything. At this point in my life, I’m happy to be healthy and energetic enough to bounce around where I want when I please.
One day, maybe I’ll find it attractive to move to a big house in the country and stay put for a while. Grow a garden and raise chickens and adopt a bunch of cats so Louis has friends. But that will be in time. Right now, I love my life on the road.
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