First, I came to terms with the idea. I've known about this move for over 3 months now, but I did not feel like it was real until a couple of weeks ago when I was supposed to give a list of all my stuff and its price to the insurance company. It is easy to put a price on shoes and bags, because I know how much did I pay for them. It is hard to put a price on a piece of paper saying "It is your birthday, have $50 in the Itunes Store" because its nominal value is of about $0.02, and its sentimental value is just not valuable for the insurance companies. That's when it started to get to me.
After my insurance list, I had to pick a new home. I have always lived in the same home, with the same people. Also, for as far as I remember, we always have more or less the same visitors. There is always someone making noise somewhere in the house. I had to pick a home to be all alone in it, or to start again with new inhabitants, or to lure new visitors. In my house I know where everything is, and where everything used to be, and why is it there, and when was it moved. Now, I have to start all over again.
I decided to avoid in my new home the few things I dislike about my current one. I had an important set of "no-no's". First of all: no stairs. I currently live in a fourth floor without elevator, so I decided to move into a house. Second: no neighbors blocking my car, so I looked for a house with its own parking space. Third: no communitarian services and/or someone to manage them. All my wishes came true, I am lucky.
House chosen, insurance papers filled, I had to pack it all. 40 huge boxes came out of my room. What is all that!?!? Will I wear this again?? I have to leave behind my family and my home... I was not going to leave my clothes as well. They can all come, the picking will be done later, when I have the time or the head. After it was over and the boxes left in a container, it hit me hard.
There it was, the room I had lived in for the past 20 years (I used to sleep in the one right next to it before, I am not cheating with my age), completely empty. There was the furniture, the bed, and the old TV I am not taking with me... but that was it. No ornaments, no personality, no mess (I am indeed a very messy person). It looks huge. It seems not mine. It breaks my heart.
And now, it is time for the farewell parties, the phone calls and the hugs. As I start crossing out names of the list of People I Must See Before I Part, my heart starts feeling a little like my room. Empty, without personality, without a mess. I leave and my friends, family, enemies, and acquaintances stay. I know there's email and Skype, and I still feel like I don't know how will I be able to survive without them. Of course I know I will, I just have not figured out exactly how.
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