or the past month and a half, I've been staying on Julie's couch. Don't feel bad -- it's a sleeper couch. And Julie lives in Hyde Park, the very pink of cozy neighborhood charm. The houses here are so cute they hurt. Porch swings, trellices, dainty gardens, Christmas lights still strung up in the spring. Purple houses, blue houses, little pink houses for you - but not me. I've never been able to afford Hyde Park, although I once had a job renting apartments at a neighborhood complex on Duval. I was a college senior, looking for a quiet gig where I could work on my thesis. For the first few months, I managed the office, which meant answering phones and gorging on Starburst fruit chews. Then the spring apartment rush hit, and I had to start selling.

The complex catered to graduate and foreign students - in other words, out-of-towners who didn't know any better. They'd come in for a weekend, and I'd give them a tour of our best apartment, the only unit that had a new rug, ceiling fans, fresh paint, and no lingering smell of cat urine. The complex wasn't a dump - far from it - but it was overpriced, and no amount of labor by our sweet on-site handyman could fix the damage of a thousand keggers. My colleague there was a fashionable and charismatic college dropout named Emily. She showed people around like a hipster Vanna White, pointing out each amenity with a graceful sweep of her hand: "And here we have the study room, and all units come cable-ready." Of course, the study room was a closet, and I can't tell you how many residents mistook "cable-ready" for "free cable." But when she showed an apartment, even I wanted to rent it. By contrast, I was a disaster as a saleswoman. I rented a few units, but I always felt bad about it, and then I felt bad about feeling bad. A few years ago, someone at the paper told me I'd rented him his first place. My immediate response was, "Oh God, I'm sorry."

We were always supposed to push the same points: proximity to campus, charm of neighborhood, cluster of local restaurants, and convenience of nearby bus stop. The bus was the #7, which went straight up Duval to Highland Mall. It's the line I used to take when I was a freshman - before I had a car, or a social life, or an understanding of irony - when I took the bus to the mall on Saturdays. It's seems both hilarious and heartbreaking now that I did this, but what can I say? I was a surburban kid, who compensated for boredom or lonliness with Diet Cokes and free makeup samples. Honestly, I still do this. Not as often, but every once in a while I'll drive to Highland Mall, buy myself something on sale at Lerner's, sip on a Diet Coke in the Food Court. This is America, I think to myself - the Mexican place next to the Chinese place next to the Greek place. All of it shitty and greasy and cheap. Or the shops themselves, the slut store next to the toy store next to the Brookstone next to the other slut store. It's a meeting place for the city, one of the few that seems genuinely multiracial. And these are people I never see anyplace else, because they don't go to the same restaurants or boutiques or bars that I do, but they're still a part of this city, this city that I've always loved and known like no other. And we've come here today in the name of shopping. In the name of escape. In the name of something - what, new jeans?

How did I get started on this? Oh yes, Duval Street. It's been a lovely area to live in temporarily, although I won't be here for long. Where am I going?

More on that tomorrow.