Getting Ready to Move

Piles of junk are everywhere in our home today. The usual paper clutter prevails, of course—unpaid bills and unread mail stacked on the table by the phone, shoes strewn in a mess by the door, a child’s happy toy trail like a maze to follow, filled with delights. Then there’s the new stuff—a pile of paper clips and hair fasteners (from a time when mine was much longer) rediscovered within a cute container, cloth diapers in a plastic container without a lid, a carpet pad still laying across the front porch—a trail left during a fervent hunt for products to sell at a flea market now a few days past.

We are moving, an endeavor, which on its best of days requires upheaval and this is definitely not one of them. Best of moving days involve boxes with labels and a sense of accomplishment coupled with neatness and organization, the sense of satisfaction that comes from being almost there. We are in the early stages of this transition, the really messy part of moving if you ask me—the going through stuff phase.

The going through stuff phase, for me, involves coddling, sorting and sifting through each little treasure—knickknacks with names, journals marking a long history of dreams and my journey to them, socks without partners. Each thing I touch these days involves some contemplation, some sadness, occasional self-criticism for still having it or having purchased it at all, some compassion for self, partner and more often, the object itself, a dash of frustration and eventually, a choice—to throw it out, give it away, move it far or to not decide, at least not yet.

There are many benefits to moving. For all the anguish, emotional and object upheaval, there are the moments of tension that bring out the best and worst of us. Long stroller walks with our 21-month-old son listening to his parents debating overhead to bring or not to bring, to rent or not to rent, and most of all, when exactly to go. “Golden Gate Bridge House,” he says with a knowing nod when he hears the adult hubbub begin, then settles back in peace as he zones out our chatter and admires the baby goslings paddling by.

Moving requires digging deep in courage as well as basements, at least it does for me. Moving requires digging deep into the guts of a marriage as well as a house, determining what works, what doesn’t—what we need more of, what we’ve neglected as life has gone by. Moving requires digging deep into one’s soul of resources to keeping moving, moving, moving so one can MOVE, even in the face of exhaustion, emotional and physical.

Moving is a blessing. It brings out the best and worst and is that perfect excuse that is impossible to create artificially—causing one to do that deep inner and outer excavation of one’s reality and sense of what is. Best of all, at the end of the muck sifting, exhaustion and letting go is the ultimate Moving Promise, the best blessing of all—yet another opportunity to Begin Again.