Moving on.

I am selling my house. This is  long overdue. I inherited this house from my father and along with the bricks and mortar it comes with all the memories and entropy that he was. No matter that I’ve replaced things, renovated rooms, and had some great times here with my son, it’s still a house with a history and it’s time to get out from under that burden and bake myself in a new world. There is an element of entrapment that his house has over me. I have no doubt part of his thinking in leaving it to me was to keep me under his control after death and in many ways that’s what’s happened, though it has taken me a while to figure that out. It’s time to turn the keys over to someone else and let them fill it with new memories.

I spent yesterday spring cleaning. I took down the blinds ,crawled into the nooks and crannies and wondered why I needed two waffle makers. I estimated that the wee beastie has thirty cubic meters of lego. Does the stuff bred in the middle of the night?

Cleaning things out, assessing what I need and don’t need, has a cathartic element.  Have you done this? Moving is something we have to do every now and then and while it’s usually thought of as something to be endured, I’m enjoying it. It feels like shedding old flaky skin, layer by layer. As I push more unused things into my car and take them to the Salvo’s ( goodwill) I feel lighter and healthier.  You know all those books that tell you that stuff holds you back and makes you heavy….I think they might be right. I even culled my book collection.  I heard the gasp. I know right, shocking.  I had thousands of books. Many of them I will never read again so I’m  giving them away so someone else can enjoy them.  I didn’t look on it as tossing out friends because I’ve come to understand books are not my friends, they are things,  things that aided me in difficult times, things I love, sure, but they are things, and they will always be available. If I want to read it again, I can buy it again.  I’m better to lighten the load and move rather than have a semi trailer load of books holding me back. Friends are people out there in the read world and my living room with a bit of fiction doesn’t cut it any more.

The agent came  today and shoved a contract under my nose. There is no turning back now. People will soon begin to tour my house. It’s hard to explain the horror this would have infected me with not too long ago, and I’m happy to say that it doesn’t bother me too much now. It’s part of the process.

Onto another cupboard. I’m ruthless.

This brings me to my minimal yearnings.

I like  to be minimal. I am bothered by clutter, it makes me nervous. Peter Germany recently posted about putting his DVD collection into alphabetical order.  Yes please!  That’s exciting for me. I enjoy things that are in order and easy to get to.  If there is more stuff in a room than empty space then Kate is not a happy girl. If I open a draw and stuff is crammed into it I feel in turmoil. Coming out of the dark and wet winter, I’m staring to change the cozy darkness into open light aided by the fact that I’m getting rid of things every day.   I really enjoy this change, like a metamorphosis, that comes over me when the  planet rotates in my favour.

As I prepare to move, not a few streets away, not a suburb or even a new state, but over the other side of the world, I’m imagining myself in a new place, somewhere I’ve never lived before, where I will know exactly one person. I’m walking around all the tidy neat spaces in my mind, enjoying the different weather, the people, even the light is different, and I’m very excited. This is a liberating thing.  Have you tossed side everything you own and know and walked out on it to start something new?  I’ll keep you posted on my process.

 

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