I’ve been thinking about my first apartment A LOT lately. OUR first apartment. I moved out of my parents’ house when I was 23 the summer before I began teaching. I moved out with Sean. He was 3. With the money I had saved from working at DFCU financial and a teaching contract for the upcoming school year, I was able to procure a one bedroom apartment for my son and me. It was located in the Fairlane East apartment Condo complex.
It wasn’t too far away from my parents’ house which was good because my Mom was going to watch Sean while I taught. It was a cute little apartment that was easy for me to keep clean because it was so small. I was also more able-bodied then because I had Canadian crutches but I would leave them by the door and walk around my apartment without them. I even cooked standing up or seated in my “Cooking Chair.”
13 years and 2 locations later, I still have my, “Cooking Chair.” However, I no longer cook while sitting in it. I cook from my wheelchair except in this heat which is HORRIBLE!
I still have a number of things from my first apartment. I still have my maroon couches that are paid for (I paid those off while we lived in our second apartment). They are not that worn because as I said before, I sit in my wheelchair, not on the couch. Sean was so small for so long that they really haven’t been worn out. I still have the same living room end table, bookshelf, and desk but I only have one lamp from when I first bought them 13 years ago.
I only have one mug from the set I had back then. I replaced the bed and frame that I had back then, it’s Sean’s now. I didn’t have my current bedroom set back then. I still have the first shower curtain I bought. I ordered it online from Target. It matched the tile on the floor in my first apartment. It doesn’t match my current bathroom or even the bathroom of my second apartment but again, it’s paid for!
There is a hole on the lower right hand corner of it but I have not gotten around to replacing it. It has sentimental value to me! My Mom is annoyed by that sentimental value I am attached to this and one more thing. A clock that I had on the wall by the dining room table of my first apartment I still have! This clock annoys my Mother even MORE!
So it cost me less than $20 13 years ago from Target. It’s broken. It’s ALWAYS 6:09. Day or night! My mom has told me to throw it out but again, sentimental value! It’s just wall decoration now because I use the clock on the stove to find out what time it is. I see this clock every time I go into my kitchen and I always have to look at the time even though it NEVER changes! I think about getting it fixed but it will cost MORE to fix it then it was to buy it in the first place so for now, I’ll just leave it. Sentimental value! That first apartment seems like a lifetime ago for me now in so MANY ways!