KT,
Yesterday, it seemed so strange to be in your apartment without you. Indeed, the memories of being there with you flooded over us. You had created the perfect space for living the life of a student: A bit austere but with all the right stuff. A couch with a coffee table in front of a big screen TV on a stand. Big is always better for viewing sports. And of course HD. The walls with pictures of the Ducks, Michael Jordan, the burning bush from Island in the Sky, sundry sports pics, DoggMan and MadDogg, and Murphy. The kitchen table with two chairs. A desk in the studio den (what a joke when your unit was described with this, given it really was just the hallway/kitchen 2 feet wider). Your bedroom had all that was needed. It was the perfect space for you to enjoy everything right outside the door: The SPM program just 3 floors down and the street scene of riverside Portland. You had it figured out, buddy, and we so loved watching you in your space.
As Ellen put it, the tribe showed up for moving day: Family members, TomBob and Maestro, and the core group of Lena, MadDog, Beanz, and JT. We worked hard and fit everything into a 15 foot U Haul. Coming into the apartment was tough but leaving it was even tougher. Your space at 38 Davis is now empty. Our hearts and souls are now empty.
Today, I look at a 5x10 foot storage unit, filled with you, and fall apart. Your space is now stacked and densely packed. Your space is now memories of stuff you liked, things you did, all the stuff that makes a life worth living: Your snow board, your wings poster, your oversized shoe shelf, your endless count of Rogue beer bottles only matched by shoes, your collections of stuff, some of which appear random but they were you. It’s all so orderly and cold, in boxes without the warmth of being strewn about in your space. As Tom and I finished filling the 5x10 unit, something got it in the way of shutting the door. It had been a struggle to get everything in as it was but now, we were just a little bit off. Something didn’t fit. When we finally got the door shut, something still doesn’t fit. It just doesn’t fit to have you only in our memories and not in our space.
JT
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