I know it is ridiculously superfluous to say "I hate moving" but by jesus god almighty, I am mightily sick of moving. It brings into such sharp relief my attachment to my stuff and how ridiculous it is to be attached to thrift store records and (11 and counting!) boxes of books. Why can't I say I've had them, enjoyed them and release them gratefully to the universe? I don't know. But when our little "Relocube" ships East next week, it will hold almost no furniture and lots of crazy thrift store decor. Why can't I just get rid of it? I need a good cleansing fire or something - (uh, universe I'm only kidding about that one). Selling our goods on Craigslist has been a barrel of laughs - typical e-mail about my couch - "on a scale of one to ten how would you rate the overall comfortableness of the couch? Lumpiness? Is it more taupe or tan? Did a smoker EVER sit on this couch?" - which is selling for the extremely reasonable price of $50 and has 3 pictures posted so just come on over and take the damn thing, wouldya? We have determined that musicians in this town have Craigslist on their RSS feed or something because all instruments listed sold within half an hour. If only our house was full of instruments instead of novelty cookbooks...
We also had a yard sale - aka Living Hell to me. Here's how it works in this household: I price, sort, set-up and post signs and AH is the poor sucker condemned to spend all day outside talking and bargaining with the inevitable crazies while I literally hide. Given that I love attending yard sales, it is ridiculous how much I hate the people looking at my stuff, asking questions and trying to bargain me down from my 25 cent book price. He is a good man to put up with it all.
In amongst all these fun activities, my Mom did come to stay. This visit turned out to be very, very important to me. After she left, I realized this was the first time I had spent with her as the only kid in a hundred miles, ever. For a middle child, this is pretty overwhelming stuff. I was forced to take center stage and my house and neighborhood and likes and dislikes were Number One. So odd and yet, oddly satisfying. And, she spoiled the pants off of me, which is not how we do it in my family. As a graduation gift we spent the day shopping together and she bought me a lovely grown up bag for school next year
and we went on a maternity clothes shopping spree and then hit the motherlode of baby clothes at the Carter's outlet, which made the baby thing seem rather real. I hope they like yellow or apple green. She saw my house and furniture choices for the first time since I was 22 or so. She ate food I cooked at home and sat with me in the kitchen as I cooked. She walked through my neighborhoods, saw a movie at my favorite theatre, ate at my favorite places and took one of my favorite hikes. It was like dating or something, where you get to show who you are, only the funnier, smarter, cuter version of who you are. And I think she liked me. And I think she just "got" me more. Sure, her partner was along who my sister accurately describes as "almost exactly like Dad, only more easy-going abut with half the class and manners" and I would, add, no dress sense or really any sense at all of what other people may be thinking or feeling. But okay, she is happy and he is fine and it only occasionally stabbed my heart that I couldn't say "my parents were in town" and can never really say that again.
One of my favorite moments was going over to my mom's camping spot on Canada Day (they were touring the Coast in a tent trailer) and laying down on her bed, reading a magazine as she cooked for us and fussed over us and I just felt awfully taken care of. Which once again brings the whole baby thing home full-force: at age 33 it will still need my time and my attention and my love just as much. Craaazy.