More Importantly . . .

I have closed on the new apartment and once again have a permanent address.  It will be some weeks before the renovations are far enough along for Velvet and me to move in, but that glorious day is in sight.

Meanwhile I'm living with a different friend and enjoying a consistent internet connection.  Velvet, on the other hand, is living with Buzz Kill and Cupcake has her own set of keys.  There have been so many unpleasant episodes at Cupcake's house that she started staying over at Buzz Kill's. Since Buzz Kill is always off training for a mini-triathlon or over at his girl friend's, Velvet and Cupcake have been having a lovely time playing house.  While I am somewhat concerned at the level of dependency Cupcake has on Velvet, everyone has noticed a dramatic improvement in Cupcake's anxieties since she's been away from her family.  Personally, I think her dad probably has PTSD or something from being in the Hungarian Military then going over the wall to come to America.  Velvet says I don't know the half of it - which is okay by me.

I'm sure I'll learn more than I ever wanted once we're moved into the new place.  Cupcake has been part of the landscape for so long that I am glad to help her in any way we can - for a little while anyway.  We'll see how things develop with that situation over the next month while the contractors are turning this neglected old apartment into a gem.  At the closing, we learned Hope, who was in her nineties when she died a few years ago, had lived in the apartment since she was a little girl.  We won't be able to restore all the prewar details back to their original condition - but close enough.  There's a budget to consider after all.  The good news is that Gigi was able to ask an architect friend to recommend a contractor, and I've been very impressed so far.

Of course, they haven't started work so it's still early in the project, but I've met three others who were all dismissive chauvinists and not particularly interested in listening to me.  They reminded me a of some doctors.  I'll be getting the estimate tomorrow or Monday, and then some papers have to be pushed between the coop board and the managing agent which should take another week.  Then an electrician will come in to update the wiring and somebody will start banging out the tile on the bathroom walls.  Some of that tile has been there since 1916, but so much of it was added later that there are three or four different shades of white, and many of them are cracked.  We're able to restore the bathtub and the pedestal sink and that's something to celebrate.  Machinists will be involved in figuring out how to fix the stopper to the tub.

Next week, I'll take all the "Before" pictures so we can document the whole project.  So far, I've tested some paint samples from Benjamin Moore and Martha Stewart.  I think we found a color for the bedrooms, but I didn't like anything I used in the dining room.  I may opt for Vanilla Custard throughout most of the apartment, but we'll see.  I've also been studying the feng shui and using the bagua map to think about where to put some of my treasures.

I'm pretty sure we've heard the last of Notta Goodman unless he figures out that the previous post shows up in search results if you search specific key words - but now that I've lost all respect for him, he can bite me.  Besides, I was much worse with The Narcissist and even though he called Google on me, I had violated no terms or conditions (Ass-Wholes Great and Small, Stonerdate 01.30.2010).  I'm declaring the Ass-Whole period officially behind me. A new fellow will turn up sooner or later.  I'm too young to wind up on the shelf - and as fucked up as some of the experience with Notta Goodman was, I really didn't care anything about him as a person - he was more of a concept since we'd only seen each other a few times in real life.

Max, who is my mentor and coach for A Course in Miracles, told me about a year ago that I'd meet a man who would teach me more about Ego than ever before - and Notta Goodman certainly did that.  There's a lot of material on forgiveness in the Course - and also in Marianne Williamson's A Return to Love.  Forgiveness is a tricky concept because, in the Course anyway, it really just means that you've decided not to hold on to a grievance largely because gnawing on grievances all the time obscures your own light - kind of like clouds across the sun.  It doesn't mean you have to let the person in your life.  You don't ever have to talk to them again - you just have to recognize the divinity within that individual too.  There's nothing anybody here on earth can do that can damage your internal spirit unless you give them that power.  If there's no lasting damage, then there's no problem.

In practice, it's damn difficult to forgive anyone else until you forgive yourself for all the mistakes you have made over the years.  We're supposed to look at ourselves and each other like we look on little kids - they aren't sinister or evil.  They just make mistakes and need correction.  When I think of people like Dick Cheney, it's hard to say, "Mistakes were made."  Notta Goodman may be making some mistakes right now - but I don't consider that it was a mistake to get involved with him because (1) there's no lasting damage at all and (2) I feel like I've made progress on my own healing journey through the interaction.  But just because I don't hold any grievances against him doesn't mean he's allowed to set foot in the new apartment.

I wonder who will be the first man allowed in the new apartment for Romance.  Certainly there will be a new Romance soon.  Woody says there are only two kinds of stories - one is where a stranger comes and the other is where adventure calls.  If we use the language of the Laws of Attraction - then I would say that I'm in the process of attracting an adventurous stranger and togeher we build a passionate, creative, emotionally rewarding, intellectually stimulating, financially stable partnership.  We have a lively, dynamic, affectionate blended family, and our home is so loving that everyone who enters is filled with welcoming acceptance.  The Laws of Attraction are unfolding all this for me right this minute.

If we were on Star Trek Next Generation, Jean-Luc Picard would say:  Make it so!