Katharine Fountain

I spent the past week clearing out my condo to prepare for a renovation. I’ve never actually seen it empty until now.  When I moved in a year ago, I arrived with just my cat and a few suitcases. The place was already furnished.

Over the past few weeks in anticipation of this  project, I found myself getting progressively stressed to a degree that felt excessive. I have a lot going on right now, but I felt like it was something I should be able to manage.

I love my home. This is the first place I’ve lived that belongs only to me. It is also the first place I’ve lived that doesn’t come with an expiry date that culminates in major life change awaiting me at the end. I’ve been thinking about that.

The second picture was taken in my Bowery apartment in August of 2020. It was the night before I had to move back to Canada after 5 years abroad. To be clear, this was not a move that I wanted  to make. I was heartbroken & fell into a state of anticipatory grief that was incredibly isolating. And I was isolated, literally. From March until August of that year I saw one friend in person twice. I developed a complex around making music. I remember I stopped flipping my calendar in May. All I could think about was the impending implosion of my life.

And I think that my body, my subconscious, remembered that. Summertime plus moving preparations = brace for “The Big Bad lLife Ruining Event: 3rd Edition” to my lizard brain.

I’m currently in bed at an airbnb that I rented for the month. The same cat that moved from Boston to NYC to Halifax then to Toronto with me is asleep by my side. I’m so tired I can hardly see, but I wanted to write this before I fell asleep. Time heals, healing is strange, sometimes subtle & definitely never complete.

Pic 3 is me in my 1st Boston apartment on the day I moved in (2015). I find this pic mildly embarrassing, but the contrast with my departure photo from the previous slide after 4 years of music school amuses me.

4 - 2019, my last night in Boston (I loved this apt)

5 is a mural that my friend painted in my very first apartment when I lived in Montreal. A reminder to make my current home (and life) a work of art.

Goodnight💗Katharine