Moving.
Relocation. These are the pleasant words we use to cover upheaval, catastrophe.
There are so many changes all at once, like no other time in your life. We all
have that friend or maybe you are her, who moved several times in her
childhood, almost bragging about her many adventures in various states and
countries, like anyone who has stayed in the same neighborhood for 20 years is
somehow less. You are mentally begging her to show you some weakness, some real
emotion of how hard it was to leave her life and build a new one.
No matter if it’s been one move in a
decade, or more, the exploding closets and cardboard fingercuts, the
SORTING…create an unrest in your belly. Your mind is constantly revising The
Move List. You find if you do not build in some horizontal time each day with a
calming cup of tea or a kava pill it will literally all explode out of you and
the movers will find a bloody mess when they arrive to remove you from what you
know. Why must we keep our moments of tears and unsurity to ourselves? Do you
think no one wants to know? Hmm, you may be right. It may take some extra
social superskill to gauge a friend’s threshold limits of honesty. As I am
about to do, I recommend you keep sharing! Think of it as a filtering process
to find that one true nugget of friendship.
(Disclaimer: I may be wrong and compulsive sharing may lead to lonely
weekends and loss of phone notifications.)
Let’s go to my closet, shall we? I
have about 6 feet of hanging rack on my side of our marital closet. No shelves,
just the hangers. It was tight. I never wore some of it. I tried this thing
where you put the freshly dried things in front so you can know what’s not been
worn. I do keep everything in sections---not by color. I’ve seen that: whites,
tans, yellows, oranges (ew), reds, purples (I don’t do this one either), browns
and black. This system makes no sense to me. As in: Oh, the weather is rainy, I
think I’ll wear a yellow top? Ludicrous. First comes function, then colormood,
which I’ll explain in a sec.
When I say function, I mean the actual
physical structure of the fabric. 30 degrees outside = long sleeves. This should be the clothing
choices that make sense. At the end
of the rack, I put hanging slacks and dresses and skirts---any long clothing
that might be disturbed by rolling drawer carts on the floor below. So we’ll
call that category “long stuff.” The order of the other groupings depend on the
time of year. I keep what I use the most closer to the closet door. Tank tops
in the summer, long sleeves in the winter. It makes sense. So as the seasons
change, I just grab all my tanks and hang them behind the long sleeves. You get
the idea. Pants and shorts get the same treatment.
Next then comes the colormood. Once
you have decided what you need to cover your body in order not to die outside,
you assess your mood. How am I
feeling this morning? Bad sleep morning-afters usually require a dark color and
flowy pants. Comfortable and dark. Grrr. Sporadically I wake up remembering a
vivid dream, which I immediately write into my dream-to-story notebook on my
nightstand. These mornings are happy and energetic---so clothing choices would
be made like so: It’s humid and cool, so layers will be more comfortable; red t-shirt
with tan cardigan hoodie, with white jean jacket.
There has recently been an exception
to these rules. If I have had sugar the day before, I know I will be having hot
flashes today. This requires a tank top and light button shirt as a jacket---no
matter the weather. The flashes started about a year ago, so I have adjusted to
this new routine also.
Which brings us back to adjustments.
Moving. Change of routines.
You can see by my previous that I like
organization. A place for everything. I can’t explain why this makes me so
happy and relaxed, but it really, really does. And I’m pretty good at it. We
are a family of four and I manage to remember where the paper clips are, extra
school notebooks, where his wallet was last seen and to keep hair and teeth
bands in their spots. (Yes, 50% of us are teenagers.)
At first, when I started sorting our
stuff, 8 months before our actual move, it was enjoyable and I liked it. If we
had not used it in a year, it was either brought to Goodwill or put in the garage
to be decided upon later. I did this in layers. I top-layered the whole 2000
square foot house: games, coats, shoes, towels, blankets. I sorted that top
layer with no anxiety or negative emotion.
Our move is to a no-season climate.
Our current home is attacked by sub-zeros and lightening, blizzards and
tornadoes. We place our outdoor grills against the patio door, so the storms
don’t blow them over the edge of the deck. Our cars, if left out of the garage,
are covered with rain, snow, ice, bird poop or yellow pollen most days of the
year. So, it is an adjustment to move into our new home, four states south. No
shovels or salt necessary. There is no shock of pollen in spring, because
there’s a steady flow all year long. This requires adjustment! Will I really
only need 2 or 3 sweaters---or is that too much? What if we vacation in the
north and I need this one pair of gloves? Will our boxes arrive only to be
opened with a slap to the forehead? Sigh.
The seasonal difference highlights a
functional change in our closets. Much like the colormood of choosing daily
outfits, there are emotional reasons we experience upheaval while sorting
things for a move. I’m not emotionally attached to my 3 shovels but… do I
really want to move 20 years of crates of both kids’ school memories? Can I
filter that down to something more manageable---like 2 crates each? What if I
throw away something that we’ll want to keep, in my frenzy to reduce our moving
truck weight?
So my process of elimination
continues. Even the second and third cycle of elimination of closets wasn’t as
painful. Recently, (I think) I finished filtering my clothes. I have kept out
14 t-shirts, 12 tank tops, only the pants I actually love to wear, and some
dressy things for a cruise we’re going on the week before we move. (I know.) I
packed my remaining winter things, and some other pieces I will keep but will
go on the truck. One last time, I’ll pack another box or two, leaving just
clothes for the 10 days we wait for the truck to arrive, which I will stuff
into my car.
What is erupting in me through this
process is my relationship with each thing. I love this aqua-colored picture
frame, though I've yet to stick a photo in it. My friends paid someone to hand
stitch this queen-sized quilt for us before we got married. Do I need to keep
it until I die, even if it’s mostly mauve? What’s the protocol here?! I love my
friends, though I don’t see them anymore…I value our memories. Do I keep this
because I might get Alzheimer’s and this will remind me of the ham salad we
made in kindergarten in 1975? Where’s the line? Do I decide---do we all decide
for ourselves where the line is between valued item and trash? I also see that having nothing to call my own as a child leaves me grasping for things decades later. (Don't touch that! It's mine!)
I’m a writer.
I’m writing a memoir. I don’t think I can throw away anything. Which means I
pack it all.
???
Time to get some calming tea.
