like humans do

"is this karmic retribution for having a beautiful wedding and an awesome marriage?"

yale and i lie awake, restlessly stewing in our angst. he groans this question in my direction, but i think it was really pointed at God. he rolls around in nightmares of insect infestations taking over the apartment; me with nausea, cramps, and teary frustration.

3 weeks in, and the apartment has cracked us.

no longer are we keeping stiff upper lips, cracking jokes, or amusing ourselves with our new housewares.

there remains an island of boxes in the center of our living room that have no clear destination. floors, tables, tv stands, and kitchen counters are still littered with moving-in debris and homeless odds and ends. the moths, who we thought we had tackled, hatched a new cloud of offspring. keys, books, and phone chargers have all been swallowed by the vortex. and the straw that broke my dear yale's back was seeing what appeared to be a large flying cockroach soar menacingly over the mess last night. i was already in bed, trying to unwind my tangled brain, but woke up when he stormed into the bedroom, infuriated by our "f-ing pit".

i've moved into apartments before. 7 in the last 9 years, to be exact. never into one this small. never into a true household merge. never into one with bugs, drain problems, weird damages, and mysterious ever-present humidity. it is a beautiful apartment. the nicest one i saw in our price range. it is a good building. we have good landlords. but somehow, it still feels like we live in squalor. and it is wreaking havoc on us.

we just want to be able to come home, have it feel like home, and relax together. our main communal activity so far has been squashing moths and hauling trash to the dumpster.

we are grossed out, tired, discouraged, and hot. stuffy and sticky. maybe it is all the cardboard, absorbing humidity in the air and slowly releasing it into the apartment. we are snipey and frustrated and feeling defeated.

"when will this start being fun?" we ask ourselves. newlywed bliss. honeymoon phase. all that stuff. we did go to the beach this weekend, and to a friend's birthday party. and to a movie. all out-of-the-apartment distractions. and each time, we came home and surveyed the disaster and the pests and wanted to cry. do a little more work, scrub a little more gunk, kill a few more moths. snark at each other. curl up into the fetal position on the bed and wonder what we are supposed to be learning from this. patience? togetherness? is this a cosmic team-building exercise? because we are failing.

some things are still fun, and funny. we love each other's company, and i miss him all day when i'm at work. but the dread of coming home to the pit adds a layer of funk that we just can't seem to shake. no matter how many hours we spend on the apartment, it still looks disgusting. where did we get all this stuff? how did we bring several thousand moths with us? why are we being jerks to each other when we are at home? when will our nest start to feel like home instead of better fit for rats?

ugh.

that's all i have to say about that.