home

feeling an odd sense of displacement. a few days ago i was reading through old blogs of mine and of friends and i remember sydney with such fond memories. park drive is no longer home and now i look back at what was home prior to moving to park drive.

bell st preston (the old PANCH)
i'd just moved to melbourne, knowing no one but my god-sisters and a few family friends who i were never close with. studying at RMIT bundoora, it seemed to make sense moving there. people constantly around, concierge to help me with things and so very close to uni. it was hell. i made no friends. my room was smaller than a shoebox and it was ages away from the friends i did make. my local safeway was the most dangerous safeway in the whole of victoria. most stabbings in the carpark than any other safeway in the state.

orrong rd armadale
beautiful apartment. wonderful flatmate. just wasn't ready. i didn't know what i wanted. i was confused with the boy i loved. i was confused whether i loved or not. lol. for the first time i felt like melbourne was home. the streets were leafy and green, supermarkets were packed with everything i could possibly want and i was around the corner from everything gay and retail. i had fun living there. i perhaps expected a bit too much, and was totally new to the whole share experience. there was a point where i just gave up. i was confused, stressed, and partnered. i was trying so hard to make that relationship work that everything else took second priority.

astorial court carlton
it became home. it was close to everything but uni (but it was closer to uni than armadale was). i don't have much to say about the place other than how great the location was. nothing in the apartment was mine. everything seemed to be at war with each other - colours, decor, me, tim. it really felt like home when tim broke up with me and i was left house sitting. then my life turned upside down when tim kicked me out with 2 days notice.

bouverie close carlton
it was only ever temporary. the day i moved in i knew i was going to be moving out. rent was too expensive for me to maintain. location was great given it was on the city border. there were dramas though. there was no carpark to my name, despite the landlord saying there was. thank god i managed to get a carpark for 5 of the 6 months i stayed there. i discovered a friend 6 floors above me. we used to hang out everyday. i miss him. dean also moved in with me for a period of time. we had some good times, and i say good because they were fun, but laced with much sadness. towards the end of the contract bouverie close, despite its shabbiness and the fact that we were sleeping on a blow-up mattress in the living room, felt like home.

harrow rd stanmore
now technically not a place i can call home, i've had some very homely memories there. the trip to sydney in july last year was the best of them all. such dreary weather outside only amplified the warmth of the old house. even when it was absolutely freezing inside, something still warmed you up from the inside out. looking back i remember fondly our makeshift plastic ashtray, the weed, the rain on the window above the shower and the homecooked breakfast. life was easy there.

park drv parkville
now most of you know how i feel about park drive. it was once home, but now i feel so uncomfortable. now i can't wait to move out, get myself a nice comfy bed and everything else i need and for once settle down for more than a few months.