The last ten years of where I have lived, and hopefully moving again.

When I add up where I have lived since 1998, it's rather daunting. I mostly feel bad for little Cooper, although he has shown remarkable resilience in the close to ten places he has lived since I rescued him at the SPCA about ten years ago. And once again, he may need to readjust his dogness, but he will like the new smells.

In 1998 I sold the Big White House in Inverness.  That was also the year my Dad died.  And the year my divorce from Assbag came through.  And the year my daughter left her husband of two years.  Whew..... what a year, right?  I had Webber then, the Wonder Dog, he didn't care where he lived as long as he had dead things to roll in. We moved into a tiny cottage without heat and without plumbing when it rained but I must say, I loved that place, I had great dinner parties there, really good sex with someone I never saw again after one memorable weekend, a lot of laughs. And from there, in the spring of 1999 I moved into another very lovely cottage in Inverness and there I stayed, and where Webber died and where Cooper came to be, for about ten years.

As I said in last night's post, I had to leave West Marin in 2010 because of the Great Economic Downturn and because I lost my job and could not find another one.  Thus began Cooper's ten year adventure of New Places to Live.

From November 2010 until June 2011 I lived with Gabe and Annie, which was lovely. I had dozens of job interviews, none which were fruitful except one in a podiatrist office and the thought of dealing with old people feet made me want to collect unemployment forever.  In June I moved, with little Cooper, to Texas for about 3+ months and lived with Jenn. We did fine, she was gone for part of the time, I did some catering, the weather was over 100 degrees every day, we had a few screaming arguments but then, on Labor Day of that year I left and drove north, up through Oklahoma, into Kansas and then veered over to Colorado, (stayed in Golden, home of Coors Beer!) and then to Wyoming and got to visit Yellowstone National Park, then to Montana (Big Sky!) which was so immense and so inspiring in some way. It was like the air was fatter there, the landscape mixed city and country and open land.  I want to go back there.

Then into Idaho where I got a call from my friend David Warnimont telling me that my other friend Margaret had broken her leg and did I want her job at a bed and breakfast place in Healdsburg.  Well, duh, I was still out of work and my unemployment was soon to end, so Cooper and I hoofed it down to NoCal and I took that job.

We stayed at Margaret's for a little bit, she had an extra vacation rental house that we could use when renters weren't there, and when it was rented Cooper and I stayed in a cheap motel or at my brother Steve's house for a night or two.  Then Margaret led me (not physically because of her broken leg and all) to a couple who had a large trailer that they were willing to rent me.  So I rented that for two months, worked in Healdsburg and in Calistoga, Cooper sometimes spent the day in the trailer, which was OK.  Finally, when I gave up the Calistoga job and worked full time at the B&B in Healdsburg, my friend  Jani from Burlingame came up and took me to lunch.

Jani was adamant that I get out of the trailer (and I was tired of sleeping over the poop tank) and just rent a place.  My hesitation about lack of jobs for the past two years was mitigated by the fact that I had a little money in the bank and could show that to a landlord so I enlisted my friend Martha to look at some places in Santa Rosa. We found one, on Benton Street. It was a small duplex but it suited me well.  (I cannot thank Jani or Martha enough for their combined encouragement and the push they provided.)

I lived on Benton for about 18 months. Then Jenn and I rented a larger (4 bedroom) house in SR and she stayed for about 15 months.  I got a roommate after Jenn left but I realized I was not good roommate material, so I found my own place, here on Slater, in SR, and I am happy here.

However, the rent is huge and I have an opportunity to move to a very tiny studio apartment in Glen Ellen, hopefully by June. This will save me so much money that I cannot turn it down. But it will mean the seventh place that Cooper will call home in less than ten years, and that doesn't count the two or three weeks in the rental house and it doesn't count the two months in the trailer.

Yes, that's a lot of moving, not just for the dog, but for me. If I add in the random places I slept and the two months in the trailer, it's ten places I have lived in less than ten years.

Sigh. But the Glen Ellen place will, I hope, last us for more than just a year or two. However, it's one more major adjustment for little Cooper. But there will be squirrels there, I am sure, and a bit of room to roam.

More on that to follow. Thanks for listening/reading this far.

.