About Me

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Eagle River, Alaska, United States
I'm just a young man tryin to find his way in these turbid waters that make up this life.

Saturday, February 7, 2009

A place to call my own

Well, I finally did it. I got my own place. After many hours searching and toiling on craigslist, and driving, I found a place.
My first choice was a nice place in the same town as St. Barnabas, Nicole and I went there after church one Sunday. I was interested, she thought the landlord was a creepy, "hard-core Prod". I didn't think he was that weird until that night.
That night he called me up and asked me some run-o-the mill landlord questions like, if I don't make enough money to pay the rent do I have some money saved up, am I a clean person, et cetera. Then he asked me questions about my church. He started off with, "You said you go to St. Barnabas, that sounds Catholic, are you Catholic?" I tried to explain that I'm Orthodox and how it's different from Catholicism. Then he said, "There is someone here I'd like you to talk to, he lives in a separate building out back and has his own bathroom. He is a professor and his name is Bob." He then handed the phone to Bob who asked me more questions about my faith and at one point even said, "...now the Orthodox church I think is real similar to Protestant churches?" It was bad.
So the next morning, Nicole and I again went on Craigslist to look for a cheaper place. Lo and behold we found one that was $400 a month for rent and was two streets over. I called the guy up and got the address, which was hard because he had a thick Asian accent.
Nicole thought that this was going to turn out bad and thought that the place might be in an area called "Little Saigon" (an area in this part of California that has a lot of Asians in it) and she also thought that the guy wouldn't like me because I'm White.
I went there, found out it wasn't in "Little Saigon", that the guy wasn't racist enough to refuse me, and I also found out why it was so cheap. The room is little more than a glorified closet next to a bathroom that I have to share with another "Caucasian" ( the word my landlord used) who smokes. I figured this was a lot better than being hassled for my faith so I took it.
After I payed the guy for my room, I called up the other guy (Bill) whose place I looked at first and told him I was no longer interested. He said that was okay and then asked if he could say a prayer for me. I thought, "What the hey? It won't hurt me, he's just being nice in his own way." So he said one of those on-the-spot Protestant prayers and ended it with, "...and we ask this in your son's name amen."
So that's my finding-a-place-of-my-own adventure. My new address is 8811 Rathburn ave. Westminster Ca, 92683. In case anyone still needs to send me a Christmas present or anything...
Saiyonara!

4 comments:

Aaron said...

Do you have a phone yet? or a job? Congrats on the new house.

The Knight Family said...

Was the x-mas present a hint to me???? Really, we were waiting until you had your own place to send it too. I guess I have to live up to my end of the bargin... Maybe monday?

James Marcel Patras said...

I have a phone. 9078630030. A Job? I sell Cutco...

The Murray's said...

Congrats James! Your first place that's all yours! :) I'm so excited for you... Anything you need??