One of the worst parts about moving into a new place is all the problems that need to be resolved right away and they come fast and heavy right off the bat, one after another, or as the Chinese idiom goes, "layers and layers in the mountain." It's one of the more stressful times, to have a deluge of new matters to take care of: coordinating with the movers as to the move-in day, setting up the gas and water, setting up the internet connection, making sure all the appliances work, cleaning a bit from the previous owner (a BIG problem from our previous owner), making repairs where needed, doing a new paint job, setting up the mail, understanding the new system of doing things in the building, setting up the rent payment system, etc., etc. It can be really overwhelming and easy to forget things during this process, and feel like things are moving at 100mph, or like putting out little fires one after another, each as urgent as the next task. During those times I envy the times when I've been living somewhere for quite a while, and familiar with everything and how it works, and can just relax a bit and enjoy life. Finally, 6 weeks into moving into our new home, after 2 washing machine near-disasters and a dishwasher malfunction, we're finally getting into a bit of a routine and being able to relax.......well, that is, after we finish the paint job of our living room, which we worked on over the weekend. Painting doesn't appear at first glance like a very difficult job, just grab a brush and start painting the wall, like putting crayon to a coloring book in 1st grade art class, right? Not exactly. Our home has pretty tall ceilings, which is great for living in so we don't feel cramped, but it also means I had to climb up the ladder, down the ladder, up the ladder, down the ladder, over and over again to paiting all the top edges and corners of the walls. Using a roller feels like it should go quick, but the rollers don't get the edgers well at all, and brushes are needed for the hard-to reach areas. Minutes turn into hours, and hours turns into the whole day, and painting just one room can turn into a big ordeal of sweat, dirty hands (got paint all over them), sore limbs from reaching up to paint) and even tears (almost, from me and MJ dealing with the stress).
It's not just moving into a new home, neither. I always felt sympathy for my co-workers (back during pre-Covid when we all went to offices and were in the same physical location as other people) when they would hurry and stumble in from their morning commute, already distraught due to the stress of getting to work through traffic, or riding the train, or just making it up the elevators which sometimes could be a chore itself (or in bad-weather states, through rain and/or snow), that when they finally sat down in the seat, I didn't want to bombarde them with new information, like the new assignment that needed to be done that day, or new emails that were sent out. I knew, like I experience myself, that it's more relaxing to take a seat, get acclimated, login to my computer, and take a breath, ease into the workday instead of have everything just dumped on me like a mountain of tasks and information.
In fact, MJ is dealing with that sort of one-after-another at her new job.......hoepfully it's a good kind of stress that will eventually help her in her career, but right now she's having a hard time adjusting....and I've definitely been there, trying to fit into the company culture, to make friends at the job, to do the job right, to know what bosses expect, to know what time the shuttle to pick her up from the hospital will come......all these things are new stressors she never had to worry about before, and it can all be overwhelming. But like painting a wall, once we get done with it, it will feel satisfying and like we accomplished something significant! "Nothing worth doing is easy."- said someone who probably had a few things thrown at him, Theodore Roosevelt.
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