My Big Move From Miami to Boston
To start this story I have to explain I have absolutely no idea how people just pick up and move. The last time I moved it was big and abrupt but I had a comfortable cushion to land on. When I moved from Orlando to Miami I had 5 days, $100, and a fire in my heart. I’ve yet to divulge details on here and maybe I will someday but all I knew was I need to get out. Luckily I was able to hop on over to my Aunt’s house where I’d been living since March this year.
Now however, I just had a lust for life. A need to push my self out of my comfort zone. If not now, when? C’est la vie! Carpe Diem! Yolo! Meaning I literally had no rhyme or reason I just felt like moving and so I applied to jobs in another city. In my mind I wouldn’t actually be packing up and moving until next spring giving myself time to save, research, visit, and most importantly plan! When I got offered a job that made more than I was currently making in a city I always dreamed of living in I knew I had to take the chance.
Fate is a crazy thing. I told my employer an arbitrary date. Booked a flight for that day two weeks later. Bought suitcases and packed my things. Well mostly packed my things at the time of beginning writing this piece i still had about 5 days left. 5 days where I finished out at one job before flying into my new home. The most stressful part of this whole journey was finding an apartment. My credit for a 19-year-old with a shopping addiction isn’t the worst by any means but for someone who also has very little savings because I just decided to pick and move I knew I would not be moving into a studio or a 1 bedroom apartment in a major US city.
So naturally my search began on college forums. I googled rooms for rent and found a million different companies all advertising the same concept. For a small monthly fee additional to rent and utilities you can find a room in hundreds of different apartments or houses all across the city. These weren’t necessarily bad options, but my low 600s credit score and age meant I had to find a co-signer, which I didn’t want to do, so I instead headed towards facebook and craigslist and an app called ‘Roomster’. For weeks I scoured and searched and closed safari and opened tiktok when I got bored of looking.
No I wasn’t exactly consistent with my search, maybe just a sporadic hour or two every couple days before I gave up until the last week before I was flying out. It was crunch time I gave up using the free version of Roomster, bought a week subscription and messaged people. I was on reddit, facebook, roomster. I was signing up for every housing site, emailing people on craigslist, searching every facebook group in the city. When it all came down to it I got so lucky. I opened the app, refreshed and was the first person to message my roommates who just listed the room 30 minutes prior.
I face-timed them, they seemed normal and friendly, risked $850 and paid rent for September. For about a week I was pacing back and forth with anxiety. What if I just got scammed? what if these strangers are part of a cult and this is their recruitment strategy? Etc, etc. So not only did I work 8 days straight while finishing out my last two weeks in Miami, but then I had to solo travel to a city I’ve never stepped foot in before, and set up camp in an apartment I’ve never seen. Thank God and the Universe, and all the ancestors everything seemed to work out perfectly and fall into place.
It had to fall into place though. Things don’t usually just work out for me, they work out incredibly well. I “coined” a catchphrase that my cousins can’t stand me using, but has proven true time and time again!! I am God’s favorite girl! The universe is always on my side. Looking at where I am now and the sequence of events that had to occur in order for me to be here there’s no doubt in my mind that a higher power exists. I’m a big believer of you cannot ask without acting and for me that means if i’m going to ask God or the Universe or anyone really for help or a favor or something I always have a plan put into motion based on what I can control.
So maybe I was always going to move to Boston and maybe I was always going to live in this apartment, but if I didn’t pick up extra shifts and put the money aside and pour my energy into moving on the day I picked maybe, just maybe I would’ve missed my chance.
Fate is unpredictable and uncertain. There are forces at work and invisible strings and a little bit of magic that lead us to where we’re meant to be. Two years ago Boston was my dream and it didn’t happen then. It didn’t work out the way I wanted it to. These past six weeks have been some of the most trying and frustrating times, but without them I wouldn’t be standing here today. We don’t always get what we want, but in the words of one of the best Glee covers, “but if you try sometimes you just might find…you get what you need!”
