24 Aug Our Massive Move Out of 2746 Saint Paul

Jill and I are camping today, trying to recover from our move yesterday. The move — emptying 5,000 square feet of belongings we’d spent 15 accumulating — took two days. Yesterday we got up at 6:00 and didn’t finish clearing out our house, once and for all, until 1:00 AM this morning.

The hard part about moving isn’t the packing, exactly. It’s the clearing out: removing every last item you own. Glance around your house or apartment and you’ll see that your sh*t is everywhere. You know that broken coffee maker you stowed in the back of your closet? And that box of term papers (shoved under your bed) you’ve been carrying around since you got out of college? How about the stack of art projects you did in middle school? And the tuxedo or dress you haven’t worn since your wedding? It’s all got to go.

The problem is, most of us are dug in too deep. That’s what makes it so hard for so many people: they don’t want to move because they don’t want to deal with their sh*t. The prospect of doing so is often overwhelming. That’s how it was for me and Jill. Visitors often joked that we’d never get out from under all of our stuff–we had art collections and book collections and antique toy collections and stacks of old wood for household repairs and piles and boxes of house parts and tools and on and on.

One motivation for our moving was just this: we had to shake loose from our sh*t. Mind you, that doesn’t mean we have downsized. On the contrary, we’re actually up-sizing by moving to a farm, where we’ll need all kinds of supplies and equipment. But the focus at the farm is wholly new and different. As for all the stuff crammed into our former Victorian behemoth: we did indeed cull through tons of it, selling off art, throwing out boxes of papers, thinning out our books, etc. It felt good.

But it was exhausting too. As our stellar moving guy — Thurman Shands of Shands Moving — said to us, “Man, your house kicked my butt.” Truly, the amount of belongings Jill and I have is embarrassing. One of the moving guys joked that we must be on the hoarder’s spectrum. When a moving expert says such a thing, you have to take it seriously because those guys have seen it all.

We moved our possessions into our barn because we can’t live on our farm for another 10 days. Our good friend Vanessa has loaned us her rental row house for the interim. So we’re camping this weekend (with the dogs) and drawing a deep breath before starting our new life on the farm.

Was it weird or sad saying good-bye to our grand, former home? Not really. We are so consumed with the new move and the many opportunities the farm offers we simply don’t have time to get sentimental. Also, we did our best by 2746 and have handed it over to a fabulous young couple from Seattle. They love the house and will be great neighbors in Charles Village. It’s a happy ending to a new beginning.