When you wonderful people out there sit down to read this, I will be likely be drinking my first cup of coffee in my new place.
Which is to say, I will have finally moved. Not completed my move, mind you. That won’t be done until I’ve covered every inch of the joint in new decor. But I’ll have at least conquered the dreaded first step: Packing and Vacating the Old Joint.
And I think it’s safe to say I’m staying put now. As in, the authorities will have to remove my fat, dead body from this duplex one day. Because I am never taping another box together, then carrying it somewhere, so long as I live.
Who cares that this isn’t where I ever intended to be? Standard real estate concerns like location, surroundings and square footage no longer matter to me. Real happiness is never again having to hear anyone complain about how much furniture I have for “just one person.”
Having grown up an Army brat, you’d think I’d be used to moving by now. Tack on to that the nine moves I’ve made since coming to Morgantown, and I should be a pro.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t work like that. You can change addresses a thousand times, and it never really sucks any less.
Of course, I realize I’m far from the first person to opine on the pain of moving. It’s not like no one has made the observation before that, hey, packing up all your stupid stuff and hauling it to some unfamiliar place, only to have to unpack it once you get there, maybe isn’t the most fun thing in the world.
But being basic is part of my charm — who doesn’t love a girl who announces that it’s snowing when it’s snowing? — so it doesn’t bother me to point out the obvious every now and again.
Especially when it is the only thing going on in my life. And part of my job is writing about what’s going on in my life.
The trouble (well, one of the troubles) is that the actual transplant-action is only part of the stress. The other bit comes from making all sorts of decorating demands and plans, before I’m even in the space, then wondering why it doesn’t look like the magazine-worthy image in my head.
Mmmm, perhaps because you were imagining an actual picture you saw in a magazine? One that bears no resemblance to the house in which you now live?
Yeah, that could be it.
So here I sit, drinking from the single coffee cup I’ve freed from its bubble wrap, looking around and wondering just where to begin.
The boxes in the kitchen?
The Glad bags in the dining room?
The Rubbermaid tubs in the hallway?
The crates on the stairs?
The laundry baskets scattered, seriously, everywhere?
What if, instead, I simply take the 400 pounds of bedding I apparently own, suspend it between all of the above, and ride out the rest of my days in a blanky fort, eating only meals I can make in this mug?
OK, I just looked on Pinterest and there are a ton.
This is starting to seem like a pretty good plan. Like playing “Castaway,” but without the island. Or Wilson. Or the loincloth.
And hopefully the loneliness and the teeth-pulling.
Though at this point, even that seems preferable to unpacking.
Katie McDowell is a lifestyles writer/copy editor for The Dominion Post. Email her at kmcdowell@dominionpost.com.
