Five minutes later, I walked into the apartment for the first time I could call it "my apartment". In reality, it was still only the third time I walked into that space. I went there the first time in January on my last house-hunting search in Hoboken - an exercise I started in August the year prior. I had seen many places, even made an offer on one. There are a few that will forever be the one that got away (someone snapped up). It was a long and daunting process. But I found me place, and got my offer accepted in mid-February - in the pre-COVID days. I was still travelling each week so I made my mom go with the inspector. At that point I was more or less pot committed. And then Covid struck.
Covid had some direct impact, like delaying every other part of the process, including the few repairs that were needed. The seller lived in the UK (the place was leased-out) and seemingly e-mails to-and-fro were being sent by ship. Of course, two months from offer to close isn't that bad, but Covid made everything seem like it took forever.
The second time I went to the place was for a final walkthrough, a couple days before the closing. Right before I went inside I had so many fears. What if I didn't like it on second viewing? What if there's some awful break or stain or something that we missed. It was too far at that point to really back out. Luckily, it was all fine.
That whole last month or so as in my mind things kept dragging on, I was on edge. Buying a house is a big decision, only made worse by the unclear pandemic-laden hellscape we were living in. The economy was in freefall, I couldn't be in too secure a place with my job (in the end, I was). Making this move in such uncertain times seemed maddening. Luckily I grew past those fears and dove head in.
By the end, I was fully excited and fully ready. Walking in on April 29th, 2020, I was overjoyed. I didn't cry, but I had this big smile plastered on my face. It was a cool feeling - my own place. I brought very limited things that first day, a set of plates and cups, a lot of cleaning supplies, a big thing of rice and a cement little hedgehog to keep outside (yeah no idea why with those last two). But overall it was a blank, empty canvas.
Working to fill up that empty canvas brought so much joy to the otherwise desolate first few months of lockdown. So many hours spent online cycling through furniture sites, working through a visualization on floorplanner.com. Even our only ventures out of the house (aside from the grocery store and my hike) was to the apartment, a true refuge. In so many ways it ended up being perfect timing.
Not needing to go into work or travel allowed me to "move in" over the course of months, bringing in things or building a piece of furtniture bit by bit. It is somewhat weird to think I "owned" the apartment on April 29th but didn't really "live" in it until about October. In the beginning, it was that Saturday voyage and generally a midweek trip for a few hours - something that in retrospect that was absurd.
In a weird way, as it became more of a home starting in October (started off staying 1-2 nights on the convertible couch to 4-5 nights on a bed now), I came to miss, if not outright long for, the early days of the empty canvas. I think largely most of the furniture and decorating decisions were good but playing God of your little own space was so much fun.
It's hard to believe a year has gone by. There's still some stuff to build out - namely my outdoor patio area, but I do feel like the home has been lived in. It is by and large cleaner than I would have expected myself to keep it at. It feels like a place I know, especially since I spent more time than I thought I would. Covid helped in that small way, making a year of homeownership already feel like a lifetime.
