Pages Turn, Chapters End.™

The walk through Down­town Los Ange­les from Syrup Desserts to Unit #312 felt a bit like a death march. It’s not that I’ve ever taken one, mind you. Still, I imag­ine the feel­ing of uncer­tainty — the feel­ing of an impend­ing end — could draw some parallels.

Begin­ning tomor­row, for all intents and pur­poses, I will be homeless.

I have the sup­port of fam­ily and friends, so I won’t be with­out shel­ter. At the same time there have been a series of events, some of which were very recent hap­pen­ings, that have paved the way for grey hair.

I’ve always wanted grey hair. I remem­ber feel­ing that way in the 8^th grade. I attempted to dye it grey at some point dur­ing high school, but that failed into a sort of orange cream. Three bleach­ings and some “grey dye” didn’t do the trick for my dark hair. Now I keep find­ing nat­ural grey hairs pop­ping up on a some­what reg­u­lar basis. I have to say, the designer in me likes the pat­tern they’re forming.

At the end of Octo­ber 2008, I learned that my par­ents could no longer afford the condo I’m cur­rently rent­ing from them. A fail­ing econ­omy, a dis­solv­ing hous­ing mar­ket, and bleak employ­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties finally caught up with the coun­try and my fam­ily were not one of the lucky ones to escape it. But, hey, these things hap­pen and I was hardly the only one.

In Feb­ru­ary of 2010, my employer of approx­i­mately 10 years decided they no longer needed my ser­vices. I didn’t mind so much, actu­ally, as I’d thought about leav­ing for some time but wasn’t sure which route to take. Luck­ily I was able to cash out my remain­ing vaca­tion hours, which sur­pris­ingly ended up being more than I had thought con­sid­er­ing I spent 10 days in New Zealand over the New Year hol­i­day. Still, the sting of being let go with lit­tle more than a “good luck” struck hard. But, hey, these things hap­pen and I was hardly the only one.

On July 10^th of this year, I received a call from my dad that Unit #312 was look­ing like it finally sold and to wait for fur­ther word on whether or not the deal was solid. A few days later I learned that the deal was and is quite solid. But, hey, these things hap­pen and I’m hardly the only one.

As my dad and the new owner worked on nego­ti­at­ing and coör­di­nat­ing the move-​out date, I made attempts at nor­malcy. That’s not to say I was ignor­ing the sit­u­a­tion. Far from it, there were dead­lines to meet and there was money to be made. Plans had been in the works: lend­ing a hand at the Jr. Derby Camp, record­ing an episode of The Rad Dudes and com­pil­ing our first exclu­sive mix­tapes, and — the biggest plan of them all, the one that had been planned for the longest — Roller­Con 2010.

Some time over the week­end of the 24^th, I got both good news and not-​quite-​so-​good news. The good news? I would be receiv­ing a large sum of money for mov­ing out in a timely man­ner. The not-​quite-​so-​good-​news? The move-​out date was set for Fri­day, August 6^th — the week after Roller­Con, the day after my birthday.

I’m now 32 years old. Birth­days don’t hold the same weight they once did and, let’s be fair, 32 is no mile­stone. My big­ger con­cern was that I’d be home late Mon­day evening, exhausted from both the travel and the trip itself. That would leave pre­cious time to get every­thing packed and to hope­fully find a new place to live.

As it turns out, there was even less time than antic­i­pated. I lost Tues­day to a meet­ing with a new client, a job worth a large sum, a sum large enough to jus­tify the loss of time. But that’s a story for another time.

I also decided to spend as much time as was rea­son­ably pos­si­ble with Bruisey, a skater whom I was reac­quainted with at Roller­Con who would be spend­ing a few days in Los Ange­les. That, too, is a story for another time.

My sinuses also have a dis­like for pack­ing. Try­ing to box items and look for prospec­tive apart­ments while either sneez­ing or in a anti­his­t­a­mine haze proved to be dif­fi­cult and dis­abled me much ear­lier in the evening than I would have liked. If it wasn’t for my dad’s help, as well as the help of my uncle Paul and my brother-​in-​law Gilbert, I would have missed my move-​out dead­line. Thank­fully the move-​out dead­line was extended. The new owner left town on Fri­day giv­ing us until Mon­day, the 9^th, to be out. This allowed for a lit­tle less stress and an oppor­tu­nity to pack and label boxes prop­erly before my dad would truck them off to stor­age. Again, I owe my dad an absolute debt of grat­i­tude. He did the major­ity of the heavy lift­ing as I’m nurs­ing a shoul­der that was slightly dis­lo­cated (is that like “kinda preg­nant”?) dur­ing a chal­lenge bout at Roller­Con. Once again, that is a story for another time.

I wrote the fol­low­ing as my sta­tus on Face­book on Fri­day, August 6^th, at 10:14am.
(http://​www​.face​book​.com/​z​u​l​a​i​c​a​?​v​=​w​a​l​l​&​a​m​p​;​s​t​o​r​y​_​f​b​i​d​=​1​4​0​3​1​9​6​8​2​6​6​9​074)

David Zulaica‎, as fur­ni­ture makes its way out of Unit #312, is begin­ning to feel nos­tal­gic and remem­ber­ing all of the good and the bad and the in-​between, both old and new. Pages turn, chap­ters end.™

Walk­ing “home” to an increas­ingly emp­ty­ing condo this evening proved more dif­fi­cult than I had expected, but my out­look is sur­pris­ingly bright. “Things have a way of work­ing out.” I say that to my friends who find them­selves in dif­fi­cult sit­u­a­tions and I’ve caught myself say­ing it in my head. I sup­pose that would qual­ify me as a glass-​half-​full kind of per­son, but I think it’s the dreamer in me, the one who hopes upon hope. Luck­ily Gia popped up online to remind me of that when I got in. I also owe her a debt of gratitude.