lauren's blog.

love, shlove.

Roaches

jakehurwitz:

It’s hard for me to write this. I think I have a roach problem. They’re not crawling all over the place or anything, in fact I’ve only seen two since I moved in on May 12th. But in a way, this is worse. It seems like they only come out every once in a while just to instill the fear in me that they exist.

I saw the first cockroach the day after I moved in. My stuff was still unpacked, and was scattered all over the place. It was early in the morning and I was laying on my bed when I saw an enormous roach scurrying across the floor. I froze. Terrified, I watched it crawl under my refrigerator. I put my head back in defeat. I had moved into a cockroach infested apartment. I couldn’t help but imagine a huge colony of insects running around behind my kitchen appliances, plotting how they were going to crawl into my mouth while I slept. I was still thinking about this when the cockroach reemerged and slowly crawled toward my nightstand. I leapt up, I got a huge roll of paper towels and I silently crept toward the bug. It was so big, and I really didn’t want to have to feel it crush in my hands, so I decided to try to trap it in the paper towel and throw it out the window. That didn’t work. The cockroach freaked out, I freaked out, I had to kill it. I didn’t want to. It just happened.

At first I was sure that there were tons of cockroach witnesses. Who saw me kill their brother or their friend or whoever he was. I felt like they were plotting revenge. Every night I got home I was scared to turn on the lights because I thought I’d just see my floor covered in cockroaches. Opening closets was hard to do without bracing myself. But eventually I started to rationalize, that cockroach must have come into my apartment by accident. That’s why he crossed the floor in broad daylight, that’s why he didn’t stay behind the fridge, that’s why he got so scared when I tried to help him. I finally started feeling comfortable in my place. After almost 2 months, I was confident. Then there was yesterday.

The cockroach I saw yesterday wasn’t any bigger than the first one. But he was on the toilet seat. To me, thinking that cockroaches are coming out of my toilet is pretty much the worst thing that can happen. I killed this one without mercy, I flushed the toilet and pushed him in. I did feel bad, but I’m operating out of fear, not moral code. So now I’m stuck. Do I get roach traps? I’m afraid that will just attract more. Do I call my landlord? I bet he’d set set up traps. Do I start sleeping with protective netting? Where do they sell that?

In a way this whole thing makes me feel like a true New Yorker. Not just because of this problem so many of us share. But because I know that this means I have to harden as a person. I’m a 6 foot tall human being. And even the biggest cockroach I’ve seen isn’t more than a few inches long. I am smarter. I am faster. I have paper towels. I have a toilet that I can flush. I don’t necessarily want to say “Bring it on.” But if these cockroaches want to keep showing up one at a time every other month. I’m ready.

 i’m really glad you’re tumbling more text posts!

+1

add Debbie Matenopolous to the list of celebrities i wish would fall off the face of the earth.

have a good day : )

limbo

life is NOT worth losing

i can’t believe my last post on saturday morning was a quote from George Carlin, and my post today is about him passing away. i’m so sad :(

R.I.P, my favorite comedian.

life's tough, get a helmet

on my way to work yesterday i looked in my rearview mirror to see a motorcylicst man on my ass, wearing no helmet. there’s one thing i hate more than motorcycles, and thats the douchebags who ride them with no helmet on.

so i put my windshield-washer fluid on full blast for a few seconds.

whatever moves you

"home" sweet home

i spent all weekend visiting friends and my mom in my hometown. after living in new britain for almost a year and going back home rarely, i really noticed how fucking small this town is. for real, blink and you miss it. i also noticed how much of a country girl i’m not anymore. in high school i used to be able to do 60 on backroads in my 98 dodge neon with no problem and no fears. now? now i do 30 on backroads, clutching to my steering wheel bracing for every pothole (which appear every 2 feet) while i am also a moving deer target. aparently the deer have gotten pretty out of control back in my hometown, because every familiar face i had small talk with was sure to include “watch out for deer, especially at night. i saw 17 today already.” so you can imagine my posture and expression as i drove past 3 cornfields on the way back from the movies sunday night.

saturday i spent the day at the beach with my mom and then made dinner with her when we got home. then, the girls and i went to a small house party for some drinks. sunday i went to the beach with one of my best friends, kelly, all day and then went out to dinner and saw SEX AND THE CITY! sunday was my favorite day. we had so much fun together. yesterday i went to the beach again, then had to drive back to new britain to meet my boyfriend home in time from his return from Canada. 

this is the first trip back home that i was actually glad to be there the entire time, and was even a little sad to be leaving. i’ve established a new life, my own life, for myself up here in new britain and i love everything about it. but i think i just miss how simple things are back home and how it all represents a time before life became different…expensive, grown up. while i was there this weekend i just wanted to wrap my arms around the whole town and give it a huge hug. for a long time i have refused to refer to my hometown as simply just “home” because i don’t live there anymore and keep in touch with only a few friends who still do. but spending the weekend there, at the beaches i’ve been going to all my life and driving down familiar pothole-infested backroads, i realized it still is my home because there is a piece of my heart there. and afterall, “Home is where the Heart is.”

its there with my best friend and some family. it’s in norwich with my mom. it’s in newport, RI with my aunt. it’s in new london with kelly. it’s in florida with my grandparents. it’s here, in new britain, with my boyfriend and college life. and its soon to be in my new apartment that i’ll be moving into august 1st!