I Moved Here Two Years Ago Today

And I don't feel much like celebrating.

The panic I felt when we had traveled a whole exit away from where I had called home for the past three years still grips my heart every time I think back to that moment. My no longer long distance (as of that very moment) boyfriend was driving the U-Haul and Max (my cat) was drugged up, laying in my lap. I was numb.

The decision to move wasn't an easy one rather a logical one.

My now ex and I both were sick of riding the Bolt Bus every weekend to see one another. Sick of the Skype sessions and talking to each other's frozen faces on our laptops. Sick of feeling pangs of jealously when we saw other couples taking their same zip code addresses for granted.

Plus, I didn't have a job or much hope to find one left. I had recently pulled myself out of outpatient (eating disorder) and made the choice to leave zulily (a negative, suffocating, underpaid environment that sucked the life and creativity out of its creatives) in order to keep my recovery and my sanity. I was flat broke, exhausted by job hunting, and insanely lonely as will happen with unemployment.

I needed a change and this seemed to make sense: move to Vancouver where my boyfriend and soon to be new job was. I sincerely heard the warnings (never move for a guy), concerns (but you love Seattle so much), and encouragement (you don't know until you try) and I made my choice. Plus Seattle isn't that far right?

Fuck that. Seattle is far. Not necessarily in miles or hours of drive time--but when you are no longer central to the things that make you feel like you, make you happy, make you at home--you're far. Far from yourself.

And two years later--which is what they told me it would take to be comfortable here--I still feel far. Even farther than I was before. I no longer have a home in Seattle and I don't have a home here. Life, construction and growth has changed what I used to know and love.

And Vancouver? Portland? I still don't know Burnside from uhhh another city street. My boyfriend and I are no longer together and with that came a painful distance from people I felt like were my family. It's like I moved here all over again.

The past 6 months I've fucked up, scrambled, drank, danced, partied, played, and held on tight to anything that felt like home and belonging no matter how detrimental, unhealthy, fucked up the situation / person / activity was.

Sinking lower into depression, anxiety increasing, my eating disorder and substance abuse oh and you can't forget the inevitable self-hate--I once again feel homeless.

I am unhappy here. I am barely keeping my head above water at my job. My rent kills me. And I have lost my best friend and the people I considered my family here. And yet, somehow the motivation for change isn't there. I'm disgustingly comfortable in this lifeless, depressive, anxious routine I cling to to get by on everyday. I feel useless, unmotivated, unwanted and am getting more and more comfortable with being in this incredibly uncomfortable place.

Making excuses, justifications, and just the slightest alteration so I can continue to wallow in my self-pity. I have no goals, I have no ambition, no dreams I'm just merely existing. I worked so hard to try to make it work here. To do the right thing. And I just feel more fucked up than I was before I left, but there's no going back so I guess I just keep trying to more forward.