I remember a conversation I had with myself back in 2003.
I was moving out of the dorm by myself.
and for the last time.
After 7 semesters of hauling boxes and suitcases up three flights of stairs, I was moving back to my parent's house while I finished up my final semester of college.
While my friends sat at the coffee house and celebrated the end of finals and the beginning of Christmas break, I was packing books, clothes, and Russian nesting dolls.
"Now at least all your stuff will be together in the same place." I told myself.
No more missing outfits left at home. No misplaces books left at school. All my business would be together.
for the last time.
or so I thought.
It's seven moves later. SEVEN. From our tiny, sparse, newlywed apartment in South Carolina, to our even tinier studio apartment in New York, to our sprawling 5 bedroom parsonage, to a storage unit while we lived in our van for a summer, to our economy apartment in the city, to our transitional townhouse...to our own three-bedroom ranch in small town Iowa.
And all my stuff is back together again.
In the new house I'm unpacking boxes of stuff I haven't seen since 2007. I'm realizing that time loosens our grasp and changes our priorities on all this stuff. Pillows, books, picture frames I thought I couldn't do without will now be blessing other people and other homes. While I'm finding a new home for precious pictures, and memories, and this history I've been building with my love.
Looking over journals, memory boxes, albums chronicling those first tentative conversations through dating, engagement and now almost six years of marriage...I know that if I'm with him I'm home.
for the last time.
I was moving out of the dorm by myself.
and for the last time.
After 7 semesters of hauling boxes and suitcases up three flights of stairs, I was moving back to my parent's house while I finished up my final semester of college.
While my friends sat at the coffee house and celebrated the end of finals and the beginning of Christmas break, I was packing books, clothes, and Russian nesting dolls.
"Now at least all your stuff will be together in the same place." I told myself.
No more missing outfits left at home. No misplaces books left at school. All my business would be together.
for the last time.
or so I thought.
It's seven moves later. SEVEN. From our tiny, sparse, newlywed apartment in South Carolina, to our even tinier studio apartment in New York, to our sprawling 5 bedroom parsonage, to a storage unit while we lived in our van for a summer, to our economy apartment in the city, to our transitional townhouse...to our own three-bedroom ranch in small town Iowa.
And all my stuff is back together again.
In the new house I'm unpacking boxes of stuff I haven't seen since 2007. I'm realizing that time loosens our grasp and changes our priorities on all this stuff. Pillows, books, picture frames I thought I couldn't do without will now be blessing other people and other homes. While I'm finding a new home for precious pictures, and memories, and this history I've been building with my love.
Looking over journals, memory boxes, albums chronicling those first tentative conversations through dating, engagement and now almost six years of marriage...I know that if I'm with him I'm home.
for the last time.
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