A deeee-luxe apartment in the sky

We're movin' on up, indeed.

First off, in order to appreciate my latest home, it's best to appreciate my home of the past year, lovingly known as Maui East. (Maui East was thus named due to a trip to Maui Maui that I took with my Columbia classmates and Alex shortly before we graduated. The week in Maui, after 3 years of high-intensity work and drama and lack of sleep, was like heaven on earth. Absolute peace. And beauty. And love. In a desire to carry that feeling into our day-to-day east coast lives, our humble Jersey City dwelling was named Maui East.) Maui East consisted of the top three floors of a brownstone in a lovely section of Jersey City. Really, Maui East was made up of the 5 people who resided there, more so than the place itself. The people were a perfect match. Absolute peace. And beauty. And love. It was wonderful to share my morning tea with Huling, with whom I would swap life advice and literature. And how I loved to come home to find Charlotte smoking her Camels on our front stoop. And Liz's morning vocal warmups soothed me into consciousness each day. The 5 of us co-habitated without any drama or ill-feeling or noise complaints. The house was big enough, and our schedules mixed enough, that we could go days without seeing anyone else who lived there, but it was always a happy occasion when our paths crossed. Honestly, it was the perfect living situation for me, after living through the hell of My Year in Las Vegas. I needed people. I needed creative people. I needed intellectual people. I hit the jackpot. The people of Maui East were exactly what I needed.
The place itself, well....
The place itself was a fixer-upper, in every sense of the term. The attic room that Alex & I moved into was known as "The Junk Room" until we took it over. Old graffiti on the walls (from the house's former life as a drug den, operated, we assume, by Pepe, since Pepe's name was prominent on the walls), peeling paint, holes in the plaster, a hardwood floor that splintered if you sneezed on it, a "closet" that had been used as wood storage until we moved all the wood out, windows replaced by cardboard (which were later replaced by old windows which we closed tight with duct tape, magical duct tape), a bathtub which always seemed dirty no matter how hard I scrubbed, bathroom ceiling tiles which threatened to collapse on our heads at any moment (and which did, in fact, collapse on our heads when Alex & I tried to "fix" the ceiling with duct tape, and upon us rained chewed-up ceiling materials and grey-fur nests made by some kind of critters who's poop pellets also rained down on our heads, soooooooo icky nasty disgustingly GROSS)...well, you get the picture. In the winter, we froze. In the summer, we melted. The place we called home during our year in Jersey City was far from what we'd call "deluxe".
And so, you can imagine why, in Alex's 3-day apartment hunt to Seattle in late July, he decided that he wanted to embrace the high life a bit. Seattle's rents have gone up quite a bit since we moved away 7 years ago, but compared to New York, everything is a bargain. We had some rather specific parameters set in our housing search: walk-ability (while it's easy to get around Seattle by car, I much prefer to walk--or bike--everywhere, no matter the time of day or night); an office for Alex (after a year of combined bedroom-office living, there was no debating this); a view (since Alex works from home, and works about 16 hours a day during .football/basketball season, the man deserves at least a glimpse of the world outside). That's it, as far as our demands went. But it was surprisingly difficult to find such a place. However, it was found. And how. It shouldn't be surprising that Alex would walk into the place that we are now calling "home" and decide that it was perfect. Honestly, it looks like a casino suite: floor-to-ceiling windows looking south at the city skyline (we're on the 11th floor, which is the highest floor I've ever lived on); artwork with a theme (in this case, 1929 Golden Sable Champagne ads, featuring a curvaceous woman in a black gown); tiled walk-in shower stalls (no bathtub, tho, which I suppose I can live with); remote-control gas fire. This place is beautiful, no doubt about it. And while I rarely admit to casinos having any kind of class or taste, the suites at casinos are often both classy and tasteful. The only thing that differs dramatically between this place and, say, a suite at The Wynn (other than the full kitchen, that is, which casino suites NEVER have) is the plant life. This place came furnished, and along with the furniture came plants. Which I am expected to keep alive. Yikes. I like plants, really I do, I love having them in my home. I've just never been able to keep a plant alive. We'll see how this goes.
So, here we are in our newest home. We'll be here until after the Superbowl, at least, and then see where we go. Chances are, our next place won't be quite as "suite". But I have a feeling that, after living in luxury for some time, I will be adding things to my list of "apartment must haves". Like a balcony. A building with a gym and a roof deck. Floor-to-ceiling windows. And, oh yes, an apartment in the sky. I never need to go below the 11th floor again. Sweet.