Starting From Scratch But at Least I Have Facebook Marketplace

Moving to LA has inundated me with lots of things, both exciting and exhausting. I forget that I am young and relatively still inexperienced in the whole ‘starting over’ skill that becomes a natural promise of life the more you live it.

Here’s how it’s going: I’m managing the imposter syndrome of a new job, throwing myself into every social opportunity, and tormented with the all-consuming question of how the heck I will fit into this city.

How do I build my life when I’m starting from scratch???

A lot of that I’m still figuring out and will be for a while, because spoiler, building a new life takes time. Much more time than the 4 months I’ve been here. What I have had more immediate control over though, is building my room from scratch, in any way I want. And that’s been pretty fun. Thanks in no small part to Facebook Marketplace and LA public transportation, the (unofficial) sponsors of this new chapter.

I bought a vintage dresser from a girl named Suzie off of Facebook Marketplace who lives a two-minute walk away from me. After scouring the bottomless scrolling trap that is Marketplace like an addict for months straight, the dresser of my dreams revealed itself to me. In the listing picture of Suzie’s room, this dresser looked charming as ever. Light grayish-blue finish complementing her gray accents and soft appeal. I could only hope the dresser would mesh as well into my less cohesive, less lived-in room.

That’s the squabble with Marketplace though; you never know how the thing will fit in your own space. Imagination and dimension measurement can only go so far. It’s a risk to commit the money, time, and labor moving such a piece up to a second-floor apartment.

Outsorcing the help of two friendly Luggers with much greater strength than me, I managed to relocate the dresser into my room. Suzie gave me a fair price and a recommendation for a local pottery studio, and I relish the pleasure of housing her vintage armoire for its next life as a storage space for my folded pants.

I bought a small table lamp from a guy whose name I forget. I ventured 50 minutes via bus to Sawtelle for the transaction. Though the offer was without a bulb, I paid only $5 plus the $1.75 bus fare. The two-hour round-trip journey after work didn’t bother me. Or maybe it bothers me more to retroactively think that I traveled 2 hours to pick up a $5 lamp from a stranger. Then again, it doesn’t truly bother me.

Turns out the lamp paired perfectly with Suzie’s dresser, an off-white ruffled shade flattering the dresser’s imperfect finish. Learning that this lamp used to be the Sawtelle guy’s grandmother’s was a nicer thought to me than it coming out of a box shipped from Amazon. All it needed was a new bulb and a complementary dresser to revamp it back to its bright potential.

I bought a pair of wall shelves from a guy whose name I also don’t remember, but the journey included only a 5-minute bus ride. Far more respectable. He was younger than me, recently finished school, and was moving to Chicago for a new job the next day, deciding at the last minute these shelves were part of the clean-out purge. For $10 this man gave me two separate shelves that were about 10x bigger than whatever wrong inclination I gleaned from the listing pictures.

He mentioned that the shelves were one-of-a-kind, custom-made by his female friend. Woodwork by a woman, I mean those are shelves I will proudly hang up in my room. Cut, carved, and glossed all by impressive skill and dedication to the craft.

I knew we weren’t messing around with that cheap polyurethane foam so evident in commercially sold wall shelves. Immediately upon holding them, shoulders yanked down. Pure, dense hardwood. Not easy on the forearms. But I couldn’t be mad. These shelves were glorious in their one-of-a-kind-ness, and now they are mine. I’ll probably use them to hold my collection of perfumes and other girly potions.

The seller guy helped me carry them (we were running) to the bus that we could see approaching from the distance. Together, one 5-ft shelf in his hands, the other clunkily off-balance in mine. When I settled on the bus, I could feel my blood bumping and sweat seeping through the cloth of my shirt. I could also feel the stares from other bus riders at the spectacle I just gave them. I giggled to myself, shamelessly.

Because the shelves were too long and awkward to fit swiftly through the doors, the bus driver had to help me carry them off when we reached my stop. And that’s why I will always say THANK YOU, and mean it, to every single bus driver when I exit.

I bought a hamper from a girl whose name I also don’t remember, but she lived on Rose Ave, so in my mind her name is Rose. Technically it’s not designed solely to be a hamper. It’s a wicker basket woven in brown and dusty blue, but I bought it with the intention of filling the role of a much-needed hamper. Too many months went by in a careless cycle of chucking my dirty clothes onto my closet floor, then scooping the crumpled pile when it was time to do laundry, loose socks escaping along the way.

Conveniently, her home was right off the boardwalk and only a few streets from mine, which allowed me to squeeze in a sunset beach run before meeting her. I arrived sweaty and tasseled. Rose told me the basket had been sitting in a storage unit for too long, unused, as she was preparing to move. I thought I'd gladly be the reason that this endearing basket is unearthed back into the light and equally as glad that my dirty clothes have a reliable home instead of being banished to the floor.

$20 later, I walked a mile back home, hand in hand with my new hamper.

I bought three other wicker baskets, smaller, for storage, from a guy who lived in Santa Monica but was moving back home to India. Proper organization requires a utilitarian approach, and this is one of the less fun parts of filling an empty room.

After taking a 30-minute bus ride to meet the seller, the uninteresting transaction turned into a pleasant conversation and a passing-of-the-torch exchange of sorts, as he insisted these baskets would bring positive energy to my new room and new life. Sold, immediately. Now the baskets keep my room tidy while doubling as a good omen for my earnest new beginnings. I think that omen should stay with me forever, right? Even after I’m no longer in the beginning phase?

It’s nice to build my room from the ground up by filling it with things that carry sentiment and personality and are reminders of the cast of people that indirectly and directly helped me do it. The idea of a blank canvas to fill all on my own accord was and still is stifling. Rummaging through my creative repository, second-guessing and fixating on what my style even is, what I would do with an empty room if I were presented with it. It makes sense though. Of course, this is what I’d do. Pinterest inspo can only go so far for someone who cares less about the aesthetic of it and more about the feeling.

Xoxo!