When I was a kid, we weren't one of those families that moved. I never, ever had to change schools. My family moved once, from a trailer house into a house, when I was a toddler, and that was all it ever was. We swapped bedrooms a few times, rearranged furniture regularly, remodeled and remodeled and remodeled, even had our address change when the county installed rural street names, but my house was always my house.
From 2009-2013, I moved every three to nine months (thanks, college). Honestly, I got to be a pro at it. I could fit everything, including a tv, mini fridge, and microwave, in my Buick sedan. It became a cycle of knowing when to unpack, what to leave behind, and when to start bringing things back home to make those last days of school less cluttered.
After graduation, I stayed with my parents for eleven months. Then I moved again, into my new apartment onsite at my job, with no firm idea how long I would be there or where I would go after.
It's time to move again. Almost 15 months later, I look around my apartment, and my thoughts are all about how to pack and which items can leave first. It doesn't feel like I've been here so long, and yet every day I've been here also feels like a week. So many things have accumulated in my apartment. As my first time living alone, I supplied everything in this room, no more college roommates to split half of the household items with, and an entire space to hold whatever craft supplies and books and papers my heart desires.
With just a couple days left, I'm at the juncture of needing to pack and having zero desire to pack. I've already taken home several boxes, and a few more are all ready to go, but I hate committing to what I won't need in the next couple of days. Knowing how little time I will have to do any packing on move day is just making me that much more boxes in by the entire process.
The only good thing about packing and moving is purging. I have already taken my garbage out three times this week. Things that had gotten shoved on a shelf or mixed in with a stack of "keepers" are now exposed and on their way out. Old catalogs? Recycled. Dried up pens? Tossed. Out with the old really does usher in the new - and I am so, so ready for the new.
But I still hesitate before I throw some things away, even some obvious things. I know that I can be a bit of a hoarder, that I don't always let things go when I should, and I have those moments about the move and job as well. This is where I'm comfortable, this is where I'm safe, and this is where I know my place. It takes courage to change; I've never considered myself particularly brave. But here we are.
"...If he fails, at least fails daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory or defeat." --Theodore Roosevelt
