A Millennial in Wonderland

In March, I moved for the third time in a year. That is a funny realization for someone who had previously spent 23 years living in the same home.

From birth through February 2017, I lived in Fairfax, Virginia and had only known one house as my home. I had always felt like Cape May was another version of home, so moving here felt weird but exciting.

.That was the first move, from Virginia to New Jersey. Which continued every time that I went visiting from state to state, home to home.

Flash forward to June 2017, when I moved into a house with roommates – so I could continue to live and work in Cape May, while my parents’ house was rented for the summer.

That move was only supposed to be for four months, but I really liked living “on the farm” and decided to stay.

Good things come to an end and after nine months, it was time to move again. You’d think I’d have a system and certainly a lot less stuff. But you would be wrong, so very wrong.

In Cape May, finding a place that’s affordable for one person without roommates, is nearly impossible Everything is priced competitively, without young millennials who are just finding their way in mind.

I went from being with family to being alone to being with roommates and was ready to be totally independent.

Surprisingly, it only took two weeks for me to find the perfect new space of my own. It’s all about who you know and dumb luck. I was told I had to move out and two weeks later, I had a new lease signed. This time, for a year.

Before I saw my new apartment (or one bedroom house, or half of a duplex – whatever floats your boat), I knew it was going to be the perfect place because of the address.

The address was still the same street as my house with roommates, just 0.7 miles down the street. Not even a full mile. I hadn’t even seen the new place, but I knew it had to work because it was so close.

I saw the place and although it was small and did not have a washer and dryer, it was perfect. It took some convincing, because of my age and income, to get the landlord to rent the place to me. That’s the problem with being a millennial, but that’s another post.

Once everything was in order, I started moving. My third move in a year and somehow I had accrued so much stuff. I moved the majority of my stuff by myself. My roommate moved two pieces of furniture. And my friend Kate helped me with about five runs of stuff over, that would’ve easily taken me double the amount of time by myself.

I also had to furnish my new place, but luckily I was not starting from scratch. I had the furniture I had picked up off the street during the past year. I got a few pieces of furniture from Amazon and Target, which pretty much made me good to go.

The only and truly big purchase I had to make was a bed. For whatever reason, mattress shopping terrified me. I really did not want to do it, I hemmed and hawed how much I would allow myself to spend. Ultimately, I ended up checking out the selection at Big Lots and was surprised to see they had decent mattresses. I ended up with a Serta mattress that was firm and very budget friendly. (Shout out to Pam for telling me to go to Big Lots). I’m also obsessed with my French inspired headboard.

Overall, even though moving is a complicated very stressful process…it all worked out in the end. I did not want to nor anticipate living with roommates last year, but it was really an experience I needed (especially after living at home throughout college). I wouldn’t trade it and now I have friends!

Big thanks to everyone who helped me move into my place – Mom, Dad, Kate, Karyn, Max, Marshal and Jenn.

I am so happy to be home!