moving house
‘The house next to the Imperial. No, not on Union St, the one right next to the Imperial – sharing a wall with the pub’. I can’t say that anymore. A phrase so integral to my residing in Sydney sociality suddenly has no meaning. A (potentially misguided) boost of cultural capital by virtue of the house I almost accidentally came to live in. I had no idea when I accepted the room I would be living next to one of the most iconic gay bars in Sydney. That you could see my bedroom window in Priscilla. But I no longer live there.
It was a house I grew up in. And I am sad to leave it behind. My new house far surpasses Erko Road but I am mourning the loss of that material, tangible, signifying link to my recent, but formative past. The signifier of my first consummated love affair with another woman; my establishment as a Sydneysider, city dweller; my growing into a queer secondary habitus that I am comfortable and confident with; my academic phantasy and its blossoming realisation; the slow process of overcoming my complete social anxiety and perfectionism; the most mature decisions of my life thus far.
I somehow link my home to my subjectivity and fear that the becoming I have been will shatter in the change of my residential surrounds. Will there be a disjuncture in my becoming because I moved house?
It was my first home. The first place I lived out of my parents house where I truly felt settled and content. It was my first Sydney house. The first place I lived where I felt I had truly chosen to live, and had not lived to get away from Gosford and my parents, or because it was where they had chosen to live. It was the first house I was responsible for entirely.
It also had the biggest bedroom I am ever likely to have in my life. I am being romantic and idealistic about the house but I did love it and will miss it.
It was a house I grew up in. And I am sad to leave it behind. My new house far surpasses Erko Road but I am mourning the loss of that material, tangible, signifying link to my recent, but formative past. The signifier of my first consummated love affair with another woman; my establishment as a Sydneysider, city dweller; my growing into a queer secondary habitus that I am comfortable and confident with; my academic phantasy and its blossoming realisation; the slow process of overcoming my complete social anxiety and perfectionism; the most mature decisions of my life thus far.
I somehow link my home to my subjectivity and fear that the becoming I have been will shatter in the change of my residential surrounds. Will there be a disjuncture in my becoming because I moved house?
It was my first home. The first place I lived out of my parents house where I truly felt settled and content. It was my first Sydney house. The first place I lived where I felt I had truly chosen to live, and had not lived to get away from Gosford and my parents, or because it was where they had chosen to live. It was the first house I was responsible for entirely.
It also had the biggest bedroom I am ever likely to have in my life. I am being romantic and idealistic about the house but I did love it and will miss it.
posted by madam phantasm at 4:16 AM
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