Living Alone and Loving It?

So, I’ve finally moved to a place that is all my own. No roommate. No renting suites in a house that is also home to a very friendly, but very loud Great Dane. No ‘rents. No siblings. No waiting to use the bathroom. No one else’s dishes to clean up. No one else eating your food. Just moi. And if I feel up to it, family is still near by.

But let me tell you. There are some not so lovely, rather comical sides to living on your own.

Today’s lesson is… If you look for something to be weird, you will find it.

There’s a ghost in my apartment….

Ok, not really, but it was a good introduction, wasn’t it? I highly doubt there’s a ghost. If there is, he’s pretty quiet and chill. What is there, however, is an abundance of random sounds. My first night in my new apartment, I felt a little apprehensive. This isn’t new for me. I’m young. I’m cute. I’m a woman. In new spaces, I am always trying to get a feel for my general safety. Don’t get me wrong. Danger can lurk everywhere. But some places are generally known to be safer than others. It’s a fact. So there I am, laying in my bed, listening to silence, when I hear a loud slam.

Now, the slam could have very well been a door, something falling, whatever. But late at night in your bed in a new place, the least likely possibilities are all you can think of. In my mind, someone could’ve just snuck into my THIRD FLOOR window and knocked something over.

My poor little heart raced so fast you’d have thought I was a lab rat on speed. Bugged eyes included. I grabbed the nearest weapon, and began to creep out of my room. Everything is a weapon if you can be a little creative. In this case, it was an actual knife. Watch out now!

Let me tell you something. Walking around a house to check for an intruder is the most pee-in-your-pants excursion ever! You are thinking of what to do if you DO find someone. Will you be able to overpower them? Do they have a gun? You are absolutely terrified of actually finding someone. But you don’t want to just lie in bed and hope that any potential intruders will just evaporate into mist. Lying in bed equals sitting duck. You are the tripping, falling white girl in the beginning of the horror flick who doesn’t think to get up and keep running. You’re asking for it. You could make a run for it. But what if they catch you outside? And then there’s the rush of opening closet doors, bedroom doors, heck, any doors. You pray there’s nothing, you brace yourself for something.

Oh… no one else goes through this but me? Oh, ok. Whatever, haters. I have a serious need to be safe and an overactive imagination. What do you expect?

So there I am creeping around my apartment. I hear the slam again and consider making a run for my door. But I forgot to mention the other perk of living alone; questionable amounts of clothing. TMI? Sorry. But now you know just how ridiculous I looked. Running outside, or any sudden moves was a bit of a problem since I deftly leaped out of bed without remembering to properly dress myself.

“Excuse me Mr. Killer Rapist Psycho Burglar while I put on some pants.”

At any rate, the logical part of my brain surmised all along that it probably wasn’t a serial killer on rampage. It was probably something extremely normal. Except during moments of late-night-fear, I’m soooo not listening to the logical part of my brain. I finally creep around the corner to the source of the sound. What did I see?

An open window! (that I left open) Someone HAD crept in. Oh sh**, Sally! (logical brain sighs in resignation) I stood very still watching the room from a corner. Suddenly the wind blew in wooshed a door shut. SLAM!

There was my intruder; an invisible fiend with no respect for my nerves. The wind was blowing through a window I was at fault for opening; a window I clearly forgot that I had opened to begin with.

I went back to my bed laughing at myself. As I snuggled under my covers, I noticed that my closet door was cracked open…..

The saga continues…….