“Your couch has more miles than my Buick.”
That was my former father-in-law’s statement in 2013 when he found out his son and my former husband’s career was taking us back to Florida. After spending more than two years in Idaho, we were doing yet another cross country move.
This week, I’m moving again to another condo – this time in Muskegon’s Midtown, just six blocks from where I work.
In the early years of my marriage, we moved nearly every year, but always in Michigan. After our son graduated from high school and headed to college, our moves spanned the nation.
I had hoped to stop that pattern since my divorce, but sadly, life had other plans. Two condos, two apartments, two shared living spaces in seven years – it’s never been my goal to continue my well-rehearsed patterns of packing and saving moving boxes.
One box in particular stands out since I’ve had it ever since 2009. Our movers first packed canning jars and my canning equipment from the basement of our house in DeWitt. I didn’t unpack it in Florida the first time. I didn’t unpack it in Idaho either. It remained packed until 2013, our return trip to Florida.
Finally, in early 2014, when I was leaving Florida, my former husband played Tetris with my shoe collection and managed to fit all of them into this one box. I believe he knew even then, he wanted me gone.
Since then, I’ve used it for every move to pack my many pairs of shoes. You can see the layers and layers of tape across the top, and it’s become my personal guide for when my love of shoes is getting out of hand. If they can’t all fit in the box, I have too many!
Today I packed up all my shoe boxes once again, leaving it open for my house slippers and the extra set of trainers I keep near the door. I’ll tape the box up the night before movers arrive and carry it across town one more time.
But this time, the box is going to the recycle bin when it’s unpacked.
I’m done moving – no matter what the future brings.
Writer and Raconteur 