We're Moving (Again!) by Nancy L. Eady

So, I’ve done everything humanly possible to make sure this didn’t happen. I didn’t change the shelf paper in the kitchen cabinets (we don’t have shelf paper in the kitchen cabinets for exactly that reason. My dishes and glasses haven’t suffered for lack of it.) We made sure we weren’t traveling on New Year’s Day. (This superstition may be restricted to my family, where we firmly believe that if you travel on New Year’s Day, you will move during the next year. I can’t even tell you where it started.)

When we moved into this house in May 2021, I swore it would be my last move ever. I even made sure I got to that last box that never gets unpacked and unpacked it over a year ago. And yet here we are – about to go through the whole moving process one more time.

After a long search, my husband has taken a job in another city about two hours north of where we live now. I’m not fond of the moving process, but I don’t mind where we’ll end up, becasue my mother and one of my sisters and her family live there. But I dread putting the house on the market, waiting for it to sell, packing up and moving, then looking for another house and moving into it, and spending hours unpacking again.            

My husband had a good idea to help with unpacking – invite all of my family over for Christmas dinner and to open gifts. Once we’ve finished with the gifts, we’ll tell them since they’ve gotten so good at unwrapping things, we have a surprise—and hand out boxes for unpacking. We could even throw in a “Dirty Santa” twist, where people get to swap the boxes before opening them. (Okay, we’ll probably not do that, but it was fun to think about!)

Late this spring, I went to my mom’s house and dug up several irises descended from irises my grandmother used to grow in Massachusetts and planted them on one side of the house. I figured since they didn’t bloom this spring, they wouldn’t bloom this fall. But two days ago, I walked outside and Grandma Caulfield’s irises were blooming. I thought it was a sweet way for the old house to wish me and my family well as we start this journey yet again.

What is your least favorite part of moving? Do you have a good story about moving? Any advice? I'd love to hear it.