Elena Stidham is a senior journalism and telecommunications major and writes “Loud and Clear” for The Daily News. Her views do not necessarily reflect those of the newspaper.
I am so sick and so tired of looking at boxes.
Seriously. For the past month I have been living out of boxes and reusable bags and surviving only off the bare essentials.
I have moved twice within the span of three weeks. I had to do an emergency apartment transfer in my former complex because my former roommates had driven my mental health down such a terrible spiral, I was having a relapse in thoughts of suicide. After the transfer to my apartment that was, mind you, temporary, I had to do god knows how much paperwork for the new apartment I will be moving to in about two weeks.
Moving is just so ungodly stressful. It’s been cited in numerous surveys and articles to be the most stressful thing an adult can do.
Why does it have to be so stressful? It’s 2020 for Christ’s sake, you’re telling me with all the technological advancements and incredible discoveries, we still have to ask a friend with a minivan to make multiple trips of manual labor?
People will say, “Ah man, this semester is so stressful.” They probably have furniture and they’re probably not going to be moving it until the end of the year. I went from being fully furnished to halfway furnished to the barest of essentials that I had to learn to build myself.
To eat breakfast, I sit at a coffee table that my best friend gifted me on a bean bag chair she also gifted me. She gave me 70 percent of the furniture in my apartment right now. If it wasn’t for her, I would be sleeping on a floor right now; she gave me her mattress.
So many people don’t even realize just how insanely expensive the whole process is, either. I had to drop $300 on furniture, appliances and groceries the day I moved in — and that was buying the cheapest of my supplies. That’s not including my down payment or deposit, and god knows how many other bills I’ll have to pay.
At the moment, the only additional bill I have is electricity, but fun fact: I have to buy my own internet. No biggie, I thought. I’ll use my personal hotspot at home for my laptop until I can get it.
Another fun fact: Personal hotspots have limits. Apparently, after you hit the double digits with gigabytes, the personal hotspot will purposely be slowed down until it’s renewed in the following month.
I haven’t watched anything on Youtube at 240p since I was eleven watching one episode of anime broken into six parts with Spanish subtitles and a buffer every 45 seconds. Now I can relive those fantastic memories with an overdrawn hotspot! With a startling 15-minute loading time for a news article and an error every time I attempt to log into my Facebook page.
I never thought in my life I would say I was excited to hop onto Ball State’s wifi.
At the moment, my “home” is a mattress on the master bedroom floor across from my desk and bookshelf with a fully functioning kitchen and bathroom, yet with the other bedroom basically acting as a storage room for all my boxes filled with stuff, with my living room and dining room being about 35 percent complete. And it’s going to remain this way until my boyfriend finally moves up next month with everything else we need.
I will say, however, despite my complaining, moving was one of the best things that’s happened to me. I escaped people that were absolutely toxic to my life and I grew closer to the people that truly mattered throughout this whole process. I live in a place I’m happy with and I’m comforted at night knowing that soon it will be complete.
But it’s just exhausting. It’s so unnecessarily hard when really it shouldn’t have to be.
I should be happy I am in a safer environment, free from toxic roommates. I should be worried about classes and graduating, not about coming home after a long day to boxes stacked high, taunting me.
But I am not. I am so stressed for no good reason other than I moved my belongings to another location.
So yeah, forgive me if I come across tired or cranky.
Contact Elena Stidham with comments at emstidham@bsu.edu or on Twitter @elenastidham.