moving day.

today's the ex's moving day. should be an absolute whirlwind, considering that he's only half packed so far. he didn't start until about 10pm last night, and then had to tear around until he was too exhausted to do anymore. i went out dancing to give him some space... came home around 11:15 to find boxes everywhere and 2 very freaked-out cats. (monkey really, REALLY gets nervous when she sees anyone packing, even just a suitcase. i had to sit with her on my lap and coo at her to calm her down.)

so, i went to bed at midnight, but didn't fall asleep until about 3am because my ears were filled with the sounds of boxes being dragged across the floor, packing tape screeching out of the roll, the tv blaring in the background. then monkey, still freaked out, decided at 4am to pee all over the ex's clothes (i've told him for a year not to leave them on the floor, but he always does). so now i'll have to do the laundry this morning, so he's not packing clothes soaked in urine. *sigh*.

so i'm running on 2 hours of sleep. hopefully i'll be able to get a nap in before i go out tonight, assuming his move is done at a decent hour. one of my girlfriends is going out with me to karaoke night, so that we can toast the official start of my new life. but i have to say first, that in the scheme of breakups, this had to be the best one ever. seriously, i think we are the poster children for what an adult breakup should look like -- civil, even friendly, with lots of support and understanding. we should write a book.

dancing was PHENOMENAL last night. we westie-bombed a club in south boston... for the non-dancers out there, swing dance "bombing" (in this case, "westie" = west coast swing) is when a bunch of dancers go to a non-swing venue and dance. it's a fun change for the dancers, and it gets a lot of new people interested in learning. the guy who organizes the monday night dance arranged with the club's owner to play a lot of west coast swing-y music* last night... this way, we had a friday night place to go dancing (most of the dances are during the week), and then the club crowd could see what it looked like and maybe a few people would start coming to the club on mondays to take classes.

so there were a bunch of dancers there, some people i hadn't seen in a while. i danced my ass off. and it was so much fun to dance in more of a club setting, with flashing lights and video screens going and all. (most swing dances in boston are in knights of columbus halls and such.) there was a girl there who was AMAZING... just a fantastic dancer, elegant and sexy and fun to watch. plus she had an ass like a freakin' peach, what an incentive to get back to the gym. turns out she's a national champion who just moved here from san diego... i'm going to contact her for some private lessons, because i wanna be just like her when i grow up. *grin*

the ex will be up soon to finish packing. i should shower before all hell breaks loose here.

* west coast swing music = mostly funked-up stuff. think Prince, Beyonce, Anastacia, some J-Lo.

all done.

the move is over, and everyone and everything has survived intact.

i went out for a bit this morning to give the ex some space to finish packing. went to my WW weigh-in (down another 2 and 1/2 pounds, woot!), and drove around a bit, breathing in the rainy air to clear my head. i stopped at dunkin' donuts on the way home and got breakfast: a bagel and cream cheese for each of us, and a large black coffee for him (he's been dying ever since i switched to decaf, no sense in torturing the man on a day when he needs his strength). once home, i shook off the rain and toasted the bagels, and we sat for a bit in the living room, eating and telling each other we were sorry for everything. it was really bittersweet... we were sad for all the good things we were losing in each other, but we both admitted that we were looking forward to getting our lives back.

once the bagels were scarfed, he hit full-speed packing mode and i just stayed out of his way. i washed the dishes, did a load of his cat-pee-y laundry, straightened up my office. every once in a while we'd pause to divvy up some belongings: "i'm leaving the DVD player." "no, take it with you, i'll get a new one." "no really, i want to get a new one anyway, i'm giving it to you." "what do you want to do with all the Playmobil pirate toys?" "give them to Goodwill." and so it went for a couple of hours.

at 11, the ex's college friend and roommate (who he lived with before me) showed up to start loading up his car. they were really efficient, they did 7 or 8 trips within 5 hours, stopping only for pizza i'd ordered around 2. it was amazing to see the place morph back into mine as his things slowly disappeared, leaving balls of cat hair and dust in their wake... at one point, he moved his desk and bookcase, which he'd never cleaned under in a whole year... and i swear, there was an entire cat balled up behind there. i scooped up a fistful of gray fuzz and ran it to the garbage as if it were a cootie. he grinned sheepishly, "i'll bet you're going to clean a lot when i'm gone, huh?" if he only knew. i mean, i'm not like monica from "friends", but i get really antsy when the apartment is really dirty. and the ex hates to clean... so the place has been really dirty, and so i've been really antsy. i have a huge bottle of lavender-scented floor cleaner to scrub the shiznit out of the hardwoods tomorrow.

i took a brief nap around 4... i was exhausted from no sleep last night, and my brain was buzzing from the new look of the apartment. he called at 4:30 to let me know they were coming by for their last pickup, and he wanted to say goodbye. i looked around the apartment, and the dusty, cat-hair-y floors, and wondered if i had time to vacuum, as my allergies were starting to go haywire. but i held off... there's something so "fuck you" about vacuuming before the other person is completely gone. like you can't wait to have every skin cell of them gone. my dad actually did that to my mom, when they headed towards divorce my senior year of college... after a very painful decision to separate, she and my grandmother (her mom) moved all of her stuff out of the house... and when my mom went into the living room to say a tearful goodbye, he stood there and vacuumed as she cried. i wasn't there to witness it, but the thought of it has never left me. so i didn't want to to the same to J, didn't want to ruin what has been really nice so far.

J came by a short time after, and we hugged goodbye and kissed each other on the cheek. i'm not sure where the cats were but i'm glad they weren't in the room... J is little angus's buddy, and the sight of angus looking up at him for the last time would have ripped me to shreds. funny how i'm more worried about my cat's feelings than mine... but he's not going to understand where the ex went, whereas i'm already at peace with the whole thing.

so, once J had finally gone, i looked around the apartment, and took out the vacuum. i cleaned the hell out of those floors, sucking up every last cat hair and old dorito and speck of dust i could find. i needed to clean the slate. then i went to my linens storage and took out the new towels i'd bought a couple of weeks ago... the whitest, softest, fluffiest towels i'd ever seen. and i went into my bathroom and took a long, LONG hot shower, and dried myself off with my beautiful white towel... and as i looked at myself in the foggy mirror, white terrycloth piled on my head, i smiled.