First off, how amazing was Elder Holland's talk? I mean, wow!
Okay, so I know that for many of you I've alluded to this whole story of finding an apartment, but never really told anyone the details of what happened, so now I'm finally going to attempt to spell it all out.
So I get here last week and arrive right on time, ready to go meet with the people I had arranged to see apartments with before I'd come. I was hoping that one of those apartments would work out perfectly, that I could move in everything on Wednesday and have it all figured out by the time I start work on Thursday. How nice would that be? Nice, but not realistic, as it turns out. The apartments I went to see were less than stellar situations for me, including one single gentleman, probably in his 40s, who said he was renting out a private apartment, which was really just his basement, and although he insisted that there were several other people also living there, they were all mysteriously out of town. On a Tuesday. Hm. So it was just him and his cat. Anyhow, it was pretty sad, and I'd really been hoping for a better result from my apartment search. But I resigned to staying at the Travelodge a while longer and spent the next day constantly reloading the housing listing websites to see if anything new would come up.
Although I knew it wasn't updated that regularly, I went back to the Institute/Church-run housing list, just to see if I'd missed anything, even though postings didn't seem incredibly hopeful. But I looked, and now that I had been there a day and driven around a bit, I felt like I had a little better feel of the area, and one of the listings suddenly didn't seem so unreasonably far away. So I sent the girl an email to see when she was moving out, etc.
She emailed me back right away and said I could come over and see the place, even that night if I wanted. Well, I've got nothing better to do. So I go over. She shows me the place, but then admits that while she was in a position to move out a little while earlier, she actually has worked things out so she doesn't need to move anymore, and she had just forgotten to erase the posting. But it was still a very nice night, because we all sat around and talked for an hour or so. (She'd served in one of the other Houston missions, and her roommate lived in the third Houston mission, so we had all three covered between the three of us, which gave us a lot to talk about.) They were really nice girls, and it was just such a refreshing end to the day, it really was so awesome and gave me a lot more hope about things. It was also really good to be able to ask them about ward stuff, because I'd heard our chapel here had burned down (true story) so I didn't even know where to go for church, etc. They told me all about what had happened and how to get to the Episcopalian Church that the wards were now meeting at, then they mentioned, by the way, on Friday night there's going to be this YSA activity where they're going to do a Cotillion thing where they teach you how to do these formal dances, so you should go. So Karen, the girl I had originally met, was going out of town that weekend, but her roommate Wendy called me up and asked if I wanted to go. It was so incredibly nice of her to ask, because I could tell that it was the type of thing that she would not really be into on her own, but she went so I could go too. So nice of her.
So I went just expecting to have a fun evening and get to know Wendy a little better. I wasn't expecting much more. But we get there and there was a surprisingly large turnout. So we go inside and this girl across the gym is looking very familiar. But I can't tell for sure. She looks like this girl that TAed half my classes winter semester. This girl was supercool, and I was actually much better friends with her than I normally was with my TAs because she worked with all my editing classes, and it was the same small group of people over and over, and we just all got to be pretty close. But, I had seen this girl in Provo not all that long ago, and she had made no mention of moving to Boston, so I wasn't so sure. But, as the night went on, I began to realize that this was most definitely her. So I went to say hello during the next water break. It was a fun, and we were both really excited to hear each others stories because we are both in the same field. Somewhere in there she asked where I was living and I said something like I'm not sure, I'm in a hotel right now, etc. She said that her roommate was moving out and she wasn't sure if she'd found someone to take her contract; she said either way I could come sleep on their couch until I could work something out.
So the next day I go to Watertown to watch conference with Sarah. I meet her roommates, ask them what is going on with the contracts, and they all say, it doesn't matter, either way you should come and stay with us instead of living at a hotel. So the next morning I packed up Murray and checked out of the hotel (where the people at the front desk had started to get used to seeing me everyday--I was there Tuesday to Sunday). I then went to the house in Watertown.
So the situation here goes something as follows: Amber moved out before I even got here. She already has someone moving into her room, but that girl will not be moving in until November 1st. So I'm sleeping in her room in the meantime. (They've all been so incredibly cool about this!) Liz is living here now and going to school, but after her December finals she is leaving to get married and move to Texas. So come mid-December I will move into her room. In the overlap we're going to lay low since the house is zoned for only four people, but I'll just be considered an extended-stay visitor for a couple weeks. It will actually work out great because there is a 5th room in the house, but since the license is only for 4 people, it's just an unused room at this point. So I found myself a nice camping cot and will hang out in there for a couple weeks. But I have an address, I will be staying in this house, it's all pretty amazing. When I went to work the following Monday everyone was so amazed at the story and how well it worked out for me so quickly, because I left on Friday having no clue what I was going to do, and I came to work on Monday all moved in to my new place.
I can't blame them for being amazed at how it all "happened" to come together, but I also probably could have mentioned that I'd been praying REALLY hard also. It was pretty much a miracle, yes, but I certainly know that its source is something much more significant than some random alignment of the stars in the universe, or whatever people like to mention for things working out impossibly to your favor.
This is a really great place. I actually went and saw one other place before I came out here on Saturday, which was quite a relief to see itself. There were no rotting walls, no cats, no crazy men, so that was a nice possibility also. But it was even farther from town, and I know myself; though it wasn't that far from work, it would have been a long drive from church, institute, family home evening groups, etc. And while I know I would make the effort to come out to church every week, the rest of the week I'd probably get lazy and tell myself it was too long of a drive to come out for all these other things that would give me the chance to meet people. (And Dad's father's blessing to me before I left specifically mentioned stuff about making new friendships.) So even though that would not have been a bad situation, it is just unbelievable how much better this one is: I'm living with someone I know (and quickly am getting to know the other roomies; they're pretty awesome), and I'm living with girls from the ward, so there's always someone to go with to FHE, etc. And it's also very close to downtown, so I can go do more Boston-y things in my off time. And even better, I can do it without having to drive myself!!! It's really very very amazing. I am incredibly blessed.
But, yes, driving here puts me in the worst mood ever. I can think of few things that I currently hate more--and anyone who knows me knows that there are some things that I passionately hate! It's not the traffic alone; So Cal has a lot of traffic, and while it might be nice to have less cars on the road there, it's still manageable. This is mainly because those roads were designed to accommodate large amounts of cars. These roads were not. They are the most inefficient things I have experienced in a car. We're talking 5-road intersections meeting without so much as a yield sign to give any sort of guidance. It is ridiculous, and I really hate driving here. Luckily, I love Murray, so that helps things considerably. But don't drive here. Work downtown so you can take the bus. That is my advice to you all.
Paz y Amor,
Cam
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