moving (temporarily) in the era of a pandemic + screen time
EASY CREOLE, BERKELEY —
thank you to everyone who did my survey on this newsletter last week. if you haven’t filled it out and want to, here’s the link.
for the past year, a singular, overpriced, and timeless bouquet of flowers became a silly quirk in this chapter of san francisco.
on the first day i moved to north beach, i ran to patricia the florist and got her to sell me a $50 bunch of white roses to celebrate the new place. we thought it would wilt in a week or two, but somehow the bunch dried to look as if it were fresh. and so for the rest of the year, the singular, overpriced, and timeless bouquet of flowers sat squarely in our kitchen as a flex of a talking point when anyone came to visit. yup, we got it on day 1 and it still looks like that on month 10.
today, that bouquet is upside down and in the trash. the stems are staring at me.
my home is in a slow move out mode. it is sadder than i imagined. there is something deeply unsettling a half empty shoe stand and the fact that it doesn’t make sense to buy a new, hopeful packet of spices.*
more later, but first my words + reads:
my words: contrary capital, which has raised money from tesla, sofi, twitch, and reddit, knows a thing or two about how to work with tech’s brightest mafias. now it wants to invest in them, before anyone else.
etc: i’m always interested in the idea of the smartest people of good companies going off to do their own thing. friendly reminder that i’d love to talk to underrepresented founders who took unique networks to get their first check.
learning lesson: is edtech changing how we learn? so much of coverage during the first few weeks of this pandemic was edtech’s big ol’ boom. now, i’m reeling back (and teaming up with favorites) to see how a surge in zoom classes impacts how we learn.
anyways,
this slow draw of moving out hits different than previous times. on one hand, i know i’m coming back to san francisco the moment it makes sense to resign a lease. temporary goodbyes are comfortable in that way.
on the other, sadder, end, “the moment it makes sense to resign a lease” is a packed phrase. nothing makes sense this year, it is dumb to pretend otherwise.
what i do know, though, is that in the next few months, the future is a little less foreseeable than it has been during this monotonous time period. i’ll be in a long distance relationship, working from home home, and living with my family and friends i haven’t lived near in 6 years (!!!!!!!). my best friend will be my neighbor again. the home i grew up in will be in arms reach.
all until i choose for it not to be. all until it “makes sense” to come back to san francisco.
and i think that’s precisely why moving right now is emotional. even if it is temporary, it is open ended in a way 2020 has reminded us is not to be taken lightly.
there will be no active cue for most of us to return to the cities we’re leaving. we’ll have to confront if we moved for a life or for a job. while most of us want to believe we’re driven by the former, it is so human in america to be based on the latter.
i’ll leave you with this: me and my partner were just talking about how it doesn’t make sense to each pay rent a month just to hang out with each other. he’s right, it feels silly to not spend at least a few months at home when we have the immense privilege to return to accepting parents, save money in our early 20s, and flexibility at our respective jobs.
but silliness aside, a part of me hopes we can footnote that overly realistic thought. a part of me hopes that we won’t return just because our companies ask us to, but because we miss laughing over this singular, overpriced, and timeless bouquet of a city.
watch me only be home for 3 weeks,
n
*thankfully, my partner made a spur of the moment mustard seed purchase during his solo day off and that is one of the reasons i love him. the other is because we got boujie foccacia from the italian restaurant down the street and midbite we ordered crappy papa johns pizza for our real dinner
