Desperation Vacation

      
              It was early May when I found an apartment I could sublease for the summer near the NC State campus. My funds were running low as I waited for pay checks to come through and loaned Dan money as he waited for old pay checks that never got sent out. I didn’t have the money for a security deposit or first month’s rent. I haggled with the renters and made up other apartments as leverage to talk the price down by about 500 dollars, get the first month for free, and pay to have it fully furnished.  It was 10 times nicer than anywhere I lived in college, and 100 times nicer than InTown Suites, but moving into an apartment complex full of college students definitely felt like a step backwards.
               I had six days before I could move in and I couldn’t afford more nights in motels. Dan and I loaded up the car and drove to Occupy Raleigh where we were considering setting up my tent and doing some urban camping for a few nights. I got there and it wasn’t so much “revolutionaries fighting ‘the man’ for social change” as it was a “gathering of old homeless men drinking malt liquor.” While we were technically homeless, and I enjoy a 40 oz. with friends in the park as much as the next guy, we still weren’t quite to the point of accepting ourselves as hobos.       
              Dan and I sat on the curb with our heads in our hands and our backs turned to the bars where we had been spending our money. We started wondering how we got ourselves into these demented types of situations.We were masters of surviving on a budget, but we had been going out  and spending with the false certainty that the missing money would show up the next morning. I knew Dan was good for it and I wasn't as broke as my bank account said. There were big pay checks on the way that would solve our problems, but that didn't do much to fix the current situation.
               I didn’t have the money to put a roof over my head for the next six nights, but I did have the gas to get us up to my friend Aaron’s apartment in Baltimore where he was throwing a Cinco De Mayo party. I saw the opportunity to turn desperation into a vacation. Aaron had been trying to get me to come to the party for weeks, but I didn’t have the money to go. Now that I didn’t have a place to stay and I wasn’t working the next few days, there weren’t many other options other than driving to Baltimore to act like a Mexican hooligan with one of my favorite people to drink with. Without a second’s hesitation, I sent him a text telling him to get ready, hopped in the car, and headed north to the land of crab cakes and football.
                Baltimore went pretty much as expected. Aaron and his girlfriend talked about poop entirely too much the perfect amount, Dan got lost jumping around Baltimore rooftops, and Aaron tried to convince me to move in. He had a five story house with three balconies, a rooftop view of downtown Baltimore, and plenty of bars within a stone’s throw. Everything I owned was already in the car parked out back and I was toying with the idea, but I had seen too many episodes of “The Wire” and I figured the allure of the crack game would eventually have me slanging rocks on the corners of West Baltimore.
                The Cinco de Mayo celebration was in full swing when I got a call from my boss in Raleigh. The staff was going to be cut, Dan and I would be picking up all the extra hours, and I would have plenty of work. Once again it seemed like all the pieces were falling into place. I came back to Raleigh and put my name on a lease for the first time in two years. I would be making decent money and there was a fun girl that always wanted to hang out with me. I had spent way too long thriving on the chaos of my lifestyle. It looked like for the first time in a long time I’d finally have some stability …. but stability isn't anything to blog about...

“Where all is one and one is all, to be a rock and not to roll” – Led Zeppelin