Yay! I have a new place to live. Go figure, it was a rental company, not an individual, that was finally willing to overlook the horrible credit (with an additional deposit, of course) and give us a lease.

You know what? After all the searching and the eleventh hour panic about not being moved before the start of school, house for house, this cute little Cape Cod with the cute little garden (I have banana tree) in a cute little neighborhood, was the nicest place we looked at.

Now it's just me and my laptop on the floor in the final hours in my apartment. Only things still here are a few dust bunnies, okay, dust elephants, and the art on the walls.

I have moved 15 times since I left my parents' house for college in 1988. Fifteen! Usually the pictures and knick-knacks come down first because they're quick and easy and the blank walls always make packing appear much further along than it actually is.

Not this time. Putting this stuff up was the most symbolic part of my move-in and it took more than a month to give myself permission to get comfy here.

These wall feel kind of sacred to me. The only place I have ever lived alone, or, well, been the only adult. Close enough. In some ways, this place is me: a little beat after two years, but comfortable.

All the tears and sleepless nights and I've grown more here than all the 36 years before. Maybe even enough to face the problems in my marriage with enough humility and openness to make it work this time.

But, I'll tell you a secret. Despite the beautiful home I'm moving into, despite the sense of possibility I feel with Sam, despite the un-namable joy of not having to search craigslist today, I'm kind of sad to leave here.