new river
My street ends two blocks from my house at a parking lot and a small park that transition into a pier.
This is another reason why Mike did me a favor. I turned this down originally.
j-ville
All posts tagged j-ville
I can’t sleep. It’s probably because I had not only a chai earlier today but a giganto sweet tea at about 11. I’ve been drinking nothing but water, ginger ale and, with the exception of the past five days, alcohol since maybe the end of November when I had a Mountain Dew on one of the layout days in Hopewell. On the bright side, if I wake up at noon, I still have over two hours to get to work. This may help me anyway since I’m going to Chapel Hill or Richmond tomorrow night after work. I’d get to Richmond at about 2:30. I’d get to Chapel Hill around 1. I’m getting the rest of my things Saturday and I’ll have a new bed by the 30th. My goal is to have a bed by the 16th. My work schedule and needing to go to New York next weekend makes getting a bed next week a little awkward. This whole move has been awkward. You would think, with me having nearly an entire month to prepare for this, I would have been more organized. But when was the last time I did anything the easy way? You know most of those gaps in time in my blog posts? Those are usually because I spent a day like a normal human being.
But I digress.
I’ve learned some more things about what’s going on in Hopewell and I’ve seen the website and Facebook page. To say that I feel disappointed is an understatement. I think, in October or so, I want to give the publisher a call. I doubt he’ll take it but I want to try anyway. It’ll be a cordial call. I just have a feeling about October and I want to ask him a question then. I know it’s odd for me to say this in January but trust me with this one.
Anyway, I was almost finally off to sleep when this popped in my head. Depending on how much privy you had to this blog in its early stages, you may have seen the original ending to my novel, which I hope to enter into Amazon’s publishing contest later this month. I’m finally at a point in my career when I don’t have to think about work until it’s time to go back to work. I haven’t been able to do that in nearly six years.
It’s a little weird how some things in that novel’s plot paralleled things in the last three years, especially since it was a partial commentary on the two years before that. It’s got weirder after I officially declared it finished before something happened in November.
I based my farewell column in the Hopewell paper a little on Lorenzo’s farewell column, which will not appear in the finished novel. To quote what I wrote as him writing on another character,
It was his story that inspired me. I love to write. I love thinking that my words one day shall appear on something other than newsprint. Despite this, I was, in a way, content with dreaming about passing one of my own books in Barnes & Noble without doing anything to make it happen.
I talked to Katy yesterday. She said it was very brave of me to leave behind everything I know and love in Virginia to come to Jacksonville. I never looked at it that way. She’s right. Even given the circumstances, she’s right.
Lorenzo makes a similar leap. He knew a couple of people where he was going but there was no telling how long they’d be there. He called the change a step toward what he hopes is fulfilling his destiny. He also alluded that he was sure it was because it was planned to be a temporary stop on the way to what he is to do. Taking that one step forward is the biggest and toughest. After that, it’s all gravy. But
You’ll never know if you can do it if you don’t take the risk.
… [A]lthough they may look it, barricades are not permanent. If you beat a wall long enough, it will fall.
Break down your walls.
Goodnight.
I had planned to be in bed right now but , long story short, my sheets aren’t dry so I need to wait for them.
I headed out to Jacksonville on Monday to fill out paperwork for work, set my start date and look at housing.
I was handed a giant stack of paperwork to read and sign. I read and signed it all when I got back Monday night. Although I have never worked at a place that made me fill out so much stuff, I feel good about it because a lot of it was for things I should have had to read and sign at the two other places I worked. Renée wants to live in a real city eventually so, to do so and stay in the company, I have to hope I get called up to the big leagues in SoCal in the next two years or not long after. I wouldn’t mind one of the two dailies in the Florida Panhandle when the time comes but that’s just my inner Southerner/coast dweller talking. There’s also one in a biggish border town in Texas that has a paper they own but, overall, if she wants a city, I can’t stay in Jacksonville like 10 years or anything unless Capital One or something relocates there and the population jumps up higher than Raleigh overnight. Everyone cross your fingers and hope this leads to California if I stay in the company so she’s happy.
But I digress. I’m still in Richmond and I’m talking about what I plan on doing/living some time after 2014. I guess it’s because, for really and truly the first time, I need to factor in someone else’s life in my decisions on where I’m working and what I’m doing. This may be my final drop everything and move to a random city.
I think I have Raleigh misspelled in my phone’s dictionary, which is ridiculous since I live near and drive on Richmond’s Leigh Street almost every day and haven’t spelt that wrong. *checks phone* No. I just didn’t have the frickin’ capital of a state in a metro area of over 1.7 million people.
Whatever.
As I was saying six hours ago, I went to Jacksonville Monday. I was proud of myself because it was the second and it confirmed that I get there half an hour faster than what Google Maps says it will take. Given what I think my work schedule is (I should call tomorrow to double check), I probably can’t run down to an event on a Friday or Saturday night but, if it’s 5 p.m., telling someone I’ll be there around 8:30 is a huge difference over saying sometime after 9.
I have no idea which desk is mine or anything like that. I guess that’s something for the first day. I just don’t want to slow the process down but it’s a unified copy desk for three daily papers so I’m assuming getting me situated isn’t going to mess up the flow that much. I’m going to be slow for a few days or weeks anyway since I’ll be switching from Quark 6 (they’re at Quark 9 right now, by the way) to InDesign. I have it on LSW4 but that piece of crap is far too much of a hassle. I’ll probably get myself an InDesign book for Christmas. I need to ask them which one they have tomorrow as well.
I hope you realize that the first third of this entry is me thinking out loud in blog form. Then again, if you’ve been reading this since June 2004, you definitely know that’s the case for almost every entry.
The newspaper building is for the most part an open space like the newsroom in Petersburg. There are cubicle walls to delineate sections and, from where I think I’ll be sitting, it will be easy to forget that you’re adjacent to the lobby. I hope to forget because it will be a rarity that someone comes to the lobby and asks for me. I think that’s the one thing I’m most excited about: the era of my phone ringing, email dinging and people walking in is over. I can come in and focus on what I’m there for. That hasn’t happened since copy editing for my college paper.
After leaving the paper, I met my future roommates. I was going to look at a couple places but I was sold on JD and Jamee. I wish I were more vocal but I had been awake for about 20 hours when I met them. They gave me the address and I checked out our future place. From the outside, it ranks just above where I lived in Hopewell. I liked that Hopewell house but I didn’t love it. For me to love a house, it’s going to have to look like this one in Chimborazo and that’s a tall order because we’re grossly underpaying for these digs. That’s going to be what I get when I have whatever Renée and I save up plus whatever I get for selling my mom’s house in less than 10 years.
The house, which I’ll call Bayshore for short due to that being the name of that part of town, is about five minutes from work if Lejeune Boulevard isn’t a bear. All I’d need to do is get into the left lane as soon as I turn onto it and pray I can get through a couple traffic lights before Camp Lejeune traffic locks it up. Given my work schedule in the way I understand it, this might not be a problem. Also, this way is 2.5 miles. There’s a back way that’s 3 miles. We’ll see if it’s worth the extra gallon of gas every three months. Either way, my shortest commute ever was the two miles from my first apartment to the Petersburg paper that took four minutes and some change if I caught every light and this is a pretty close second. It’s a first if you include it not requiring me to drive to Dinwiddie or Prince George after such a short commute to work.
The plan is to stay at Bayshore for at least six months. I think I’m going to stay there till at least this time next year. I’d rather have my own place at some point and they’re getting married in April so yeah. It shouldn’t be awkward but, if I have a roommate when I get married, I’d be wondering when he would go find his own place. Or I’d tell everyone we sleep in one very big bed to try to freak out the neighbors. But that’s just me.
Other than that, I think everything will be fine minus one little thing: The nearest Wawa is in Virginia.
How am I to satisfy my random macaroni and cheese fixes? By not having the urge because I should be as stressed as I was in the Tri-Cities where I medicated myself with cheesy, carbohydrate goodness? I hope so. I hope so.
Then again, I’m moving to what I consider the first fully southern state below the Mason-Dixon line so, if I can’t find good mac and cheese in Jacksonville, something is wrong with the universe.
In all, it will be OK. I know it will. Much like how I knew everything was going to be fine when I left Hopewell technically without a job Dec. 7, I know everything will be fine in Jacksonville. I’m back at a daily. At this time next year, I can say I have nearly four years of daily experience, three years of managerial experience and four years of copy editing and page design outside of my internships. As long as I keep tweeting, taking photos and blogging, I definitely can go wherever Renée wants to go when it’s time for us to live together. On top of that, I should have Brown River Blues published and at least have a draft of The Collectors done at that point, especially since I’m entering Amazon’s winner-gets-a-publishing-deal contest in January.
if all goes according to plan in 2012, it will be a year I look back on fondly and that’s before getting my book published. It’s almost showtime.
This entry has taken about an hour. My sheets are finally dry.
I have a bit of a problem now.
I think I’m going to have to switch my official address back to my mom’s for a little bit.
BECAUSE I’M MOVING TO NORTH CAROLINA.
So, technically, I was unemployed as 12:01 Thursday morning. I got a new job as a copy editor at 4 p.m. We’re in a recession and I was only unemployed for 40 hours. That’s incredible.
My first day is technically on the 30th. I have about a month to figure out where I’m living and pack up all of my stuff. I’d rather find an apartment of my own because this house has ruined roommates for me. I’ll never find anyone as awesome as Shaunelle, Matt and Loaf until I’m living with Renée.
I’m really going to miss RVA. This city has felt like home more than any other place I have ever lived. I’ll never forget my experience in this city and I fully plan to visit every chance I get. It will take me about four hours to get here to visit. Piece of cake.
I just really hope Renée can move to DC so the distance between us shrinks/stays the same. I think it’s the same distance if she moves there but running up the Interstate 95 I’ve known since before I was able to drive doesn’t seem so bad. That and the lack of tolls (for now) and it being only one state.
It’s a lot to process right now. I don’t know what to say. I mean, Monday and Tuesday, I was looking for jobs because I planned on getting out of there anyway. Wednesday, my job basically didn’t exist anymore. Thursday, I was unemployed. Now it’s Friday. What a week.
I guess I’m having a going away party on the 17th. Worst case scenario is a combined New Year’s/going away party.
