To build a home

There have been a lot of changes for me moving to Princeton (you'd think that moving gets easier, and it some ways, it does, but in other ways, it's still hard each time). One of the biggest adjustments is that I have my own apartment. This is both great (my weird "burn-both-ends-of-the-candle" hours don't bother anyone, I can talk very loudly with my boyfriend while FaceTiming him, I know that the messes in the kitchen are my own), and weird (I don't have other people to talk to when I get home, it's very quiet, and my messes are my own). 

But one beautiful thing that has happened the past few weeks is how this apartment has come together, from having my mom drive out with me to help me furnish my apartment, to having Sam come up and help put furniture together, to finally getting a couch and a mattress, and then little odds and ends that I kept on forgetting (like buying bowls or a yoga mat). Or the fact that my living room and bedroom have no real lights. It's amazing the difference having a lamp makes. 

[Let there be light]

I would say the thing that really made my apartment feel more "me" was putting my pictures and photographs up. They are reminders of what I think is beautiful--paintings, poetry, and bits that speak to my soul and remind me of other homes. 

There's something very satisfying in making a space a home--even if it's through little things. But it's a space that is mine. A room of my own. And for right now, the mix and match of that life will do.