Workin' 9 to 5.

I would like to start by saying that I am no longer as miserable as I was in my last post. The first two nights were pretty rough, but each day has gotten easier, and I felt my mood change drastically on Wednesday. This was especially helped by two events: I found out how to work my heater, and I started decorating my walls.

I'm an employee now. I go in around 9:30 and I don't leave all day. It's weird being indoors for an eight to nine hour period. It doesn't matter how cold it is outside because I'm not really going to be out there anyway. (And the cold here doesn't feel as bad as the cold in Gainesville did, which is weird but nice).

I can't really judge the level of my satisfaction with this job just yet. Their "Best of Charleston" issue comes out next week, which means twice the workload leading up to publication, which means I'm not really doing what I'm actually going to be doing every day. But I still like it. There is something very nice about doing things that consume your time. I know soon it will be easier, with more free time to take lunches and leave early and really enjoy it.

There are also perks. This weekend there is a wine and food festival in the city, and last night I was able to go with my friend Erica (whose job I took and who earned a promotion herself) to its opening night event. They put a large, heated tent in the middle of Marion Square and filled it with wealthy people and the best chefs from the best restaurants. I tried little bites from restaurants that I will probably never be able to afford on my own. I had pheasant with black truffle, homemade chorizo, this weird but tasty oxtail cake thing, and a whiskey cocktail. And more. All free. I even got a complimentary wine glass and a hand-rolled cigar. They made you carry the wine glass around all night, though. It was very inconvenient. I felt like such an adult and such a child at the same time.

I'm sorry I still haven't taken pictures. The little free time I've had is at night, when I've been too cold to want to switch positions too frequently and watch True Blood instead. But soon, I swear.

I am in very desperate need of furniture but I have little to no time to look right now.

And here I am.

I've cried a lot today. If you added up how much I've cried, I'd say it would equal at least an hour. Think of that: A straight hour of crying. And I might do it some more before the night is up. I'm feeling a little misty this very moment.

I tend to get stuck in the present. I haven't been able to think of how good this move and job could (or will) be for me. Instead, I can't stop thinking of the fact that I've left behind everyone I care about. It's totally selfish but I can't stop. I may have been miserable and futureless in Gainesville, but at the end of the day, I had friends, in my house and in a few minutes' driving distance. At the end of today, I won't have that. And there will never be another time in my life when all of those people, including me, will be together in the same place.

I want to fast forward to the time when I will feel comfortable here.

I'm in Charleston, in the house I'm going to be living in until the end of July. It's very cute, exactly what I could have hoped for. The neighborhood reminds me of where I lived in downtown Gainesville, and it's not at all like the snooty place I stayed at the last time I was here. My roommates seem nice, even though two of the three I have met are moving out. It doesn't feel like my house yet. It feels like their house, which it is. This is really strange.

I will take pictures to illustrate things at a later date.

Tomorrow I start my first real work day.

Hi Y'all

In the summer of 2008, I moved to Charleston, S.C. I had never been to the city before, but I had accepted an internship at The Charleston City Paper, an alternative weekly. I had applied to the City Paper because I assumed that every city north of Florida (where I have spent my entire life) had mountains (or hills, at the very least). I was wrong. Charleston is as swampy as Miami and Gainesville. Who knew? To document my time there that summer, I started a blog.

Almost two years later, I have accepted a job at the City Paper. A real job. With a salary and everything. Dental, even.

Journalism students, you can believe what they tell you; an internship can pay off.

Starting March 1st, I will be an actual resident of South Carolina. So I'm starting another Charleston-themed blog for much of the same reason I started that first one: I am terrible at staying in touch with people. I prefer to use the Internet as a way of organizing my thoughts than numerous repetitive phone calls. Plus I can save on minutes and texting fees and stuff.

Thusly, I hope that if you are my friend, or not my friend, or a creepy lurker, or what have you, that you will read this and share this "next step" with me.