Sophomore jinx? Could Jimi Hendrix ever top "Are You Experienced", which is quite possibly the greatest debut album in history? Anyway, here I am composing the second blog and I have already spent myself with the whole bumper sticker saga.
I'm in Milwaukee. Wisconsin. Not too far from my hometown Chicago, but still it has to be a bit odd that I landed here. There wasn't really a plan. I've now lived in 4 states in 12 months. Geographic states, that is. There have been oodles of emotional states.
About a year ago I was still in Nashville. I was transplanted there by my former wife's career and enjoyed a six-year run in Music City. I really did love it there. But all good things implode, and post-divorce I ended up needing a change. Next thing I knew my life was condensed down to what fit in a minivan and I was driving across the US to live north of Seattle and work for Alex at Tarantulas.com/Northwest Zoological Supply. It was a return to Washington state as when my ex and I first got together she was finishing grad school at WSU in the eastern part of the state. I lived in Pullman, WA, among the rolling wheat fields right along the Idaho border for 14 months in 2000/2001. But now I was on the other side of an incredibly topographically diverse state. I was living on the coast, enjoying the breathtaking views of the Puget Sound, vast stands of evergreen and glacier-draped mountains. Then the gloom set in. Mindset and weather. The dreary grey mist of the Pacific Northwest "winter" did me in. Seattle's a great city, but not if you love sunlight. Six months of bleak drizzle and stifling overcast ensued. I wanted to be anywhere else — definitely not in the big, expensive, lonely unfurnished apartment I had stupidly rented.
A plan was hatched that allowed me to continue to conduct sales and operate the website for Tarantulas.com from a remote location, and before long my possessions were again distilled to single vehicle capacity, this time in the Grand Cherokee I bought when the minivan died. After a short 9 month stay in Seattle, I was again relocating, this time headed back to family—and I thought a promising romantic relationship—in the Chicago suburbs.
I think I'll spare you the details of the two post-divorce relationships that contributed to my Bedouin nomadism. Let's just leave it with the fact that there was one at the beginning of my Seattle run that burned hot and fast like a chemical peel, and another at the end that contributed to my departure before its own fizzle. They're a huge part of the story, but let's move on shall we?
Regardless of romantic woes, the path led me back to my hometown and some much needed time with family and a few friends. I stayed with my mom and stepfather for a couple of months and I am still regrouping. I needed my own space, especially after being so unsettled since leaving Nashville. Actually, after my wife and I split I lived in my dingy little "Spider Shoppe", taking showers in my landlord's warehouse, so the unsettled feeling actually goes back further. I needed to unpack my boxes, many of which were still sealed from Nashville, and find a new home for me as well as my dog Taylor and parrot Jesse.
When I returned to Chicagoland I quickly visited my friend Bill Korinek of Theraphosid Breeding Project in Milwaukee. Billy and Bruce Effenheim operate TBP together and are extremely successful tarantula breeders. It was good hanging out with them again and, as luck would have it, Bill had recently purchased a duplex and the lower apartment was available for rent. Over beer and wine and good food we discussed the possibility of me moving in. What is more homey than a house already full of thousands of tarantulas, chameleons, leaf-tailed geckos, roaches and monkey frogs? I couldn't resist. I knew more beer and wine and good food would follow too! So the worlds of Theraphosid Breeding Project, Exotic Fauna Enterprises and a part of Tarantulas.com collided into a sort of exotic animal frat house on the south side of Milwaukee.
And that's how I ended up in Milwaukee. I'm less than 2 hours from family, but have my own little home, something I have been without since my marriage ended. Taylor has a little backyard to enjoy and we take long walks in the park right across the street.
Until next time...
Swing low sweet chariot, MJ
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