I can’t even begin to tell you how excited I am to finally be getting my very own place. Of course I can’t help thinking back to all those episoses of the Mary Tyler Moore show that I’ve been watching since I was a kid. I’ve always wanted to live in a studio apartment, and very soon I will be doing that. When I lived in my condo in New England, it may as well have been a studio, since I very rarely slept in my actual bedroom, but it’s still not the same. This will be one room, one single room, 100% me.

There are quite a few differences between me and MTM. For one, I live in a much warmer climate than she does. Thank goodness I don’t have to wear those early 70s miniskirts in below freezing temps, instead I wear them when the temps approach the boiling point. I don’t work in a newsroom, but I do work with a group of people I consider my family. And my studio is in a cookie cutter apartment complex, because really cool converted Victorian houses don’t exist here in Vegas. Check out the comparisons:

Now Mary’s apartment:

Big difference. Mary had cool architectural features such as the tiny balcony with French doors and the sunken living room with the shelves built into the step. I’ll have an alcove and an old sliding window. My kitchen’s in an alcove off to one side, but I don’t have that way cool stained glass window that would go up and down to close the kitchen off. But I do have a big K for my wall. I had to have that when I saw it in a catalog. It’s whitewashed, not gold, but hey, it’s mine – just like this studio apartment that I’ll move into on Memorial Day weekend.

The biggest thing I’m getting out of all this is that sense of independence I feel like I lost living with people out of financial necessity. My roommate and I are talking and things are back to normal now, which makes this last month much easier, but we both agree that we need to have our own space and that 2 years living under the same roof is more than enough. I’ll be much happier on my own – I was in my dumpy condo in back east (at least as far as my living space went) and I will be here. That happiness will transcend all areas of my life, and I hope it will be the start of a very positive chapter. But I’m determined – I’m gonna make it after all.

Photos courtesy internet search