Olivea, my Disneyland friend/ co-worker/Road Trip Buddy, had requested that we push the leave date to December 7th, so she could go to the Dave Chappelle/ Chris Rock show her husband had tickets ahead of time for.
I moved my ex into the spare bedroom while he was at work. This gave me the freedom to pack in the main bedroom and stage for moving out. I made lists of furniture that I’d have to donate, things to go to storage and items to be stored in my friends house.
I was stuck in limbo for a long time on Nova’s transfer of ownership from the rescue and ex was not making it a priority.
So the decision was to move forward that I was going to NY but if I didn’t get her I would move in with my friend. Both of those paths had similar setups and required me to get a storage unit.
This is where the poltergeist started. The first week after the break up my ex acted like everything was normal and that we were just roommates and that that was hunky dory. I stopped trying to make things less awkward and smooth which then turned into my ex silently standing at random places in the house. Not saying a word, not making eye contact and me not asking why he was there or if he needed something. This went on for weeks until I left. So I was basically living with the ghost of relationship past.
I made sure to keep myself busy and out of the house as much as possible. Spending time with friends I’d no longer get to see and saying my goodbyes. I also did Yoga every single day. Thank you Yoga with Adrienne. Then binging Love is Blind and Married at First Sight playing my favorite game of spot the narcissist.
Olivea and I were getting in practice road trips with each other driving from Orange County to Santa Clarita to drop off items to a friend’s house. We were in my Nissan Leaf which we had considered taking and charging cross country.
That was until the day we drove to Santa Clarita and the charging stations by my friends house were not working. The nearest kind of charger I needed was 9 miles away and I had 11 miles left on my car.
We drove the nail biting 9 miles and got to the station with 1 mile left. It was while we were sitting charging in the now pouring rain and darkness that I decided we definitely can not risk going cross country in my electric car and I needed to get a new car.
I had wanted a Kia Niro Electric car before I had settled on the Nissan Leaf so I went to look for a plug in Niro. It was just out of my budget but I was able to score a 2019 Kia Niro that had leather seats (perfect for dog hair) and fold flat seats (needed for dog kennels).
Once that was locked in I sold my Nissan Leaf to Carvana and actually managed to have the whole thing paid off and get like $13 out of the deal. Now it was time to maximize the storage. There were luggage bars but not the cross bar, so I purchased that. Did a ton of research and decided on a soft storage roof top bag that was weather proof to add to the top of the car.
I also used vacuum storage bags to load up the top rack storage with doggy gates, and all my clothes, shoes and bedding. In the car I loaded toiletries, my laptop and desktop computers, a basket full of dog things. Leaving enough room for Olivea’s bag, some dog beds and the crate for Nova. (As Nova did not do well on car rides previously.)
After donating a lot of furniture, moving everything else I owned into storage, my friends’ places or in the car it was finally time to get out of the oppressive awkwardness that I had once called home.
After a super uncomfortable goodbye around 10pm with the ex I headed over to wait for Olivea to come back from the show and hit the road. As I waited I put on one of the temporary tattoo I had purchased in the month waiting with positive sayings on my forearm. I added the one that read “Free”.
Danielle Cintron 