Kind of a rough start to the morning, I’m now running behind as it were – were I to have anything to run behind… At about 4-something-a.m. I woke from a stupid dream involving conferences, airlines, steam rooms, horrible accommodations for disadvantaged moms who let their children go missing and who lived in a depressing place with fugly brown furniture that looked weirdly like a very poor and very cheap knockoff of the two rather lovely (IMO) sideboards I have in my dining room, acting, assessments, temperamental directors, and …steam rooms. I think A. may have been in the dream as well. Maybe. It was weird and disturbing, and it was that way because I was trying to wake up as a really bad cramp had developed on the outer side of my left foot and was steadily making its way up my ankle and into my calf. It seemed to take forever to calm it down, to make it go away. I had been sleeping badly anyway, but now I was really awake. When I went back to bed it was 4:30a.m.; I tried to sleep. Eventually I did and woke again at 7a.m., feeling quite tired. W. has been running around already to answer email – he has an appointment with [company] tomorrow at 9a.m.
The rain has stopped. It rained and blew like mad pretty much all day yesterday, and I didn’t leave the house once. In the afternoon I was on the phone with N. for about an hour. They moved to an apartment in the [San Francisco area] rental complex. It costs $5, 200 per month. Holy fuck. Almost $63,000 annually… But, no taxes, no worries. They’re on a lease which runs for another twelve months or so. Then they have to decide whether they’re in for another fourteen months, or whether to move somewhere completely different. It seems like a weird and cruel place to be at when you’re older and supposedly “settled,” but it’s not that different from the unsettled circumstances in which W. and I find ourselves. Condemned to the suburbs (or at least to a smaller city in the larger conurbation that is Greater Boston) because we can’t afford Cambridge or Boston itself? Staring at 1-1/2 hour commutes (each way) if, for example, [company] works out? (And 1-1/4 hours if the Kendall Sq. company happened…) Then, post-work (if / when retirement happens), still not in the “right” place, not able to afford where you actually want to be. I told M. about my morbid thoughts (“I don’t want to die here”), and how there, where I might want to be, I can’t afford – not to mention the pain of not having family nearby, plus the social isolation. Ironically, even though she has been in [her town] for decades, she said she often feels isolated socially, too, and it’s no doubt exacerbated by our car-centric culture which requires scheduling. Scheduling is the enemy of actual community.