a grown girl needs her space

..a grown girl needs her space..

reflections on the build up to move in day ; oakland, california

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I. The Hunt for Housing

from march to july of this year, i was homeless.. not homeless sleeping on the street or in a car, but homeless.. because i did not have a home to call my own.. i had chosen to live this way.. finished my graduate school program at ucla early so i could have an extended summer& experience "ree's world tour".. in the months between the day i finished my masters coursework and the day i was to start my phd at uc berkeley, i wanted to live life like a vagabond.. so i could travel and couch surf across the globe.. i moved out my place in march so i could save on rent and decided i would figure out details of having no home later.. but in the meantime, i would find my freedom by frolicking in new cities on my own time..

well, i never imagined how draining it might be to feel so unsettled.. to exist in the midst of the paradox between the privileges of international exposure and the depression of rootlessness.. much of that time i spent longing for a home that i knew did not exist.. for a piece of the freedom that my own place would give.. i thought that my travels would keep me unconcerned with the pressures of my future, but i thought wrong.. i wrestled within myself about my ungratefulness.. i had the pleasure of wandering about the globe freely, how could i manage to feel anything but blessed?.. my travels did bless me.. the lessons i learned from the spaces i found myself strengthened my trust in me.. showed me the safety i could feel between the world and me.. but i felt an urgent need to be settled somewhere.. for all my stuff to have a place to go.. for my clothes to be hung up in my closet in the place i paid for with my own money..

for months i had no clue what that might look like.. i had applied for grad housing and never heard back, because berkeley ain't grad student friendly when it comes to living support.. i had looked all over for a place and everything was $1600 or more.. hell na.. on this skimpy stipend, i would not survive.. might have to humble myself and live with somebody, i thought as i scrolled through the disheartening adds on Craigslist.. but i knew i wanted my own place.. how was i to reconcile my desire to live alone and these high ass prices for housing?.. the Bay Area is infamous for unbelievably high rent since the tech boom.. since all the damn social media companies' employees discovered oakland ain't as dangerous as they thought it was.. in waves they started making their way into our hood and landlords hiked up their prices, pretending to accommodate the population.. so what does a lil ol broke black girl like me do?.. one who chasing her dreams with barely a dollar to her name and no trust fund.. one who just tryna come to this city to get her phd from the number one public institution in the nation.. the same institution that ain't got enough money to house me..

my dream was to find a little tiny home i could call my own.. somewhere i could claim my space.. where i never had to wonder whether or not anyone's energy was killing my vibe cuz i control this shit.. i could light my candles and burn my sage and dance with my panties on to amy winehouse in my living room.. that mattered to me more than anything.. but i also knew that my grad school stipend would never stretch that far.. so i started feeling it was inevitable to fall for the trap.. the trap of young dumb broke student life out here.. to live in a tiny room in a row house sleeping on the bottom bunk bed with a stranger.. until late may, when i got an email from a soror i had known saying she needed to get rid of her place.. her cozy little studio in the east that was reasonably priced (compared to the rest of the craziness) and had a real cool vibe.. i jumped out my seat in excitement.. i texted her immediately GIRL I WANT IT!!!.. and by the grace of god, within a few short weeks, it was mine.. mine.. mine.. i had a home.. i had a home.. i filled out my very first grown girl apartment lease and set the date to pick up my keys.. july first.. july first.. my home was waiting on me patiently.. the rest of the summer became a waiting game for july first..

II. The Triggers

at the end of may, after my solo travels had ended and i suffered from the exhaustion of instability, i went back to my boyfriends place in los angeles where i was greeted with a welcoming love.. but i was quickly reminded how much of an inconvenience it was for him to be storing the culmination of my life's belongings in his tiny little grad housing studio.. his closet had broken off the hinges from holding down four suitcases of clothes and a couple storage boxes of shoes.. i told him he was lucky that it was only four here, that i had the courtesy of sending the other three duffle bags, two boxes of books, and five trash bags of room decor to his mamas house.. he was annoyed with me.. feeling as though i could not appreciate the favor they were doing me.. at the time i was ungrateful.. feeling entitled to my right to inconvenience everyone i loved because i had nowhere to go, so they had to take responsibility for me.. for my things.. for my junk.. for my mess.. the struggle it had been to have all my shit between here and there for the past half a year.. for me and for him.. how he and his cat had slipped on my rugs on multiple occasions.. how my mirrors made him nervous because they had cracks in them.. how they had broken from being crammed up in that room.. how my shit was suffocating.. how i was holding on to so much stuff that it made his life crowded, and i couldn't find no compassion to ask for forgiveness.. i was too damn embarrassed.. i had been so used to being a burden to others in the midst of my transitions that i had never known the value of having my own, truly having my own..

i was triggered to two years ago, when i lived with a man i loved who couldn't love me.. when i wanted to leave but had no where to go.. fully dependent on his care.. no money, no home.. all my clothes and shoes and bags and boxes packed up in the closet of his one bedroom apartment.. each day got darker and darker.. clouds clogging my view of freedom.. feeling stuck.. feeling like love and lust only existed out of convenience.. i had just moved to los angeles.. it was the summer after i graduate from spelman college and the summer before the first year of my masters program at ucla and i was so ready to start.. not because i was excited for classes but because i wanted so badly to have my own.. my own bed to sleep in.. my own shower curtains to close behind me.. my own oven and stove.. my own cups and plates.. i didn't wanna have to come home to hands on me that felt foreign.. to washing dishes i didn't own.. to a life that felt numb and cold because it was not mine.. nothing was mine but my body and my mind and even that at times drifted away from me.. some days we laughed and watched movies and ate thai food and had fun.. but each and every day i felt small.. even when i tried my best to get dressed up and feel beautiful, i could not find my confidence.. constrained by the reality that i needed a man who did not need me.. that my very survival depended on my ability to put up with his bullshit.. for the first time i felt the fury of the woman who could not leave.. who could not see the progress of her life without the man who provides everything.. everything but love.. everything but healing.. there were days when i threatened to pack up and leave.. to call a friend to lend me a couch until i could get on my feet.. but i knew i wasn't going nowhere.. because my lease didn't start till august and it was only july.. i could have gone back home to philadelphia, but i was attached to the lifestyle we'd created.. too embarrassed to admit the truth about the reality of our situation.. caught up in the desire to deal with myself on his terms all because he "took care" of me..

when i tapped back into 2017, i knew this was not that.. kept reminding myself that my life was my own now.. that i was home with a new love now.. a healthy love.. a compassionate love.. a love that would never threaten to kick me out or make me leave.. a love where i never had to play those games.. but in my mind i went back to that place and i couldn't escape it.. because even though he never made me feel like i owed him anything for it, he still was the one taking care of me.. providing everything.. cooking and storing and paying rent and letting me sleep and sulk for free.. my bags and my clothes and my combs and my brushes and my books and my bras and my head wraps and my scarves and my scars all in the fucking way.. why couldn't i just have my own place? july first, july first.. life would be better july first..

III. The Move

i fixed my imagination on that date.. daydreamed about the freedoms of having my own space.. of having numbers and letters to give when people ask me for my address.. being able to firmly say "oakland" when they ask where i live.. i was so tired of living nowhere..

after atlanta and houston and alabama and new york and baltimore and dc and philadelphia and london and barcelona and this city and that city and this move and that move and this bed and that couch, finally july first came.. on move in day, i felt a rush of gods favor fill up inside me.. it was my very first time seeing the place.. bae woke me up super early and we moved all my shit out his mama's place.. rode the hour drive to the east, blasting gospel rap the whole time.. we had just come back from mexico only hours before.. and now it was time for my arrival..

pulling up was anticlimactic.. i realized i lived on a huge hill that would be a killer to walk every day.. i lived in a food desert where the closest trader joes was seven miles away.. i lived in a hood where i didn't feel safe.. but i had a place.. opening the door to my studio was anticlimactic.. it was a small box with off white chipped paint on the walls and a large window with only a view of the next apartment building's windows and walls.. that night i learned that i could hear the phone conversations of my Gucci man lovin neighbors across the way.. the distance from their apartment window to mine felt so close i could step right into their living room.. but i had a place.. i wanted to break down and cry, so consumed by the dreadful condition of the space.. the only thing i could do to stay sane was decorate.. as bae brought in bags and boxes in rounds from his car parked at the bottom of the hill to my front door, i decorated like my life depended on it, because it did.. i needed to believe this place could really be everything i needed it to be..

every day for two weeks straight i agonized about my room.. spent half my loan money on couches, mirrors, rugs, fake flowers, table trinkets, and pillows.. the tiny place started to feel cluttered.. i worked through various scenarios of chair here, desk there day in and day out.. after the fifty first iteration of my room change, my boyfriend, mom, sister and i all felt the need for a slight intervention.. each of them had spent countless time coaching me through this process.. bae peeling the sticker off the backs of wallpaper for hours, helping me make sure my room had some color pop to brighten my days.. mom helping me decide which color scheme to stick to and what my budget would and would not allow.. and my big sister reminding me constantly, "more mirrors. you need more mirrors." because my boyfriend was here with me physically, he saw everything.. finally, after driving down MacArthur Blvd with a giant couch hanging out his trunk, me holding on to it tight really thinking my grip was gon make a difference between it staying inside the car and flying out the car onto the vehicle behind us, praying the entire way for no police to pull us over - he decided enough was enough.. he'd escorted me to multiple shopping trips for more and more things that i didn't have the funds or the space for.. he'd seen me stress about the state of my place for weeks on end, one night even broken down in tears as he held me in his arms and reassured me we would work it all out.. he, my sister, and my mom were right.. i had gotten a little obsessed with the thought of creating my perfect little home.. i couldn't sleep until it was done.. and i knew it would take weeks to get every single corner perfect, every wall set (mind you, this is an itty bitty studio we're talking about).. but it was my new place and it had to be perfect..

IV. The Bigger Picture

unfortunately, july first didn't magically change everything.. its been about a month from my move in day and i still find myself up past four am sticking wallpaper in corners i missed and rearranging the distance between the couch and the kitchen table.. i still feel unsettled.. i still am tryna adjust to living far away from what feels familiar.. i still hate the fact that the dumpsters are right outside my window.. each day i have slept and woken up here i have felt heavy.. some days much more than others, and each day does get better, but a huge part of me believes i won't feel settled until it's done.. until i can look at my place and say, aaah, it is finished.. it is home.. right now it's still in limbo.. still transitioning.. and i am so tired of all the transitions.. i just wanna be fully and completely at home..

it was bigger than mirrors and chairs and desks and couches.. bigger than this tiny little studio that i am longing to embrace as home.. it was about the power and the privilege to claim space.. that's what it's been about this entire time.. a dire need to call a space mine.. when no one else is watching, knowing that i have somewhere to go.. to hide.. to heal.. to holller.. to decompress and unwind and rewind time and take it back to the twenties with ragtime then to the raggae then to jazz and blues , dancing in my too tall, too tight shoes at the party i threw for myself and sent only one invitation.. with the time and location.. dear ree, meet me at ree's house for the turn up.. see you soon.. love, self.. //

there's something about having your own shit.. something about not needing to ask nobody for nothin, that brings me a level of empowerment i can't even fully articulate.. to know that i have people i can call when i do need something, but that i do not need them for my survival.. i can truly make it out here on my own.. at the end of every day i can tell myself "girl, i got you".. emotionally, spiritually, financially.. you got a place to do yoga and meditate.. a place to journal and read.. a place that can't nobody ever kick you out of.. a place you working hard to pay your own rent to, even if it is overpriced.. a place you paying your own comcast bill in.. buying and cooking your own groceries in.. the sweetness of that type of independence when you're twenty somethin, for me, it means everything..