7) The Last 36 Hours

Your former you owes your current you a big apology.

“Meh… we’ll have this house packed up in no time,” former you confidently says.

And reality however, determined that was a major blunder on your part.

In the last 36 hours you and David have spent 28 of them frantically packing and loading your entire existence into a 118 degree, 26 foot long UHaul.

You don’t keep a lot of things, your home is mostly tidy and neat, yet magically on moving day…more and more items appear in drawers, closets, cabinets… it’s like a clown car of absurdity. You make and tape boxes. You go through roll after roll of packing tape. You’ve lost track of all the boxes.

Initially you packed slowly, purposefully. A box or two here and there, neatly organized and well labeled, perfectly stacked into cardboard skyscrapers, but the going was slow… “It’s hard to pack up all our stuff when we’re still using so much of it,” you say to justify not being ready to go.

On top of all that packing you’re also extremely emotional. As the month and weeks wind down into days, you’re acutely aware that you’ll be leaving all this behind. The comfort and security of a life you’ve steadily nestled into over the last decade and a half… and now it’s all coming to an end… a new life that you can’t even begin to comprehend awaits you. You’re excited, you’re nervous, you’re overwhelmed, you’re still not even sure if you made the right decision, you wonder if maybe you should in fact be institutionalized…

As your St Pete days dwindle, you’re routinely moved to tears, big hugs from neighborhood friends, they squeeze you tight, give you kisses on your cheeks, wish you all the best… it’s amazing to see how many people have become a part of your daily routine these last fourteen years.

Then come your good friends and family… so many people, way too much crying and tight hugs that last so long… with each day you realize that many of these goodbyes are final. And that rips at your guts.

The last 36 hours are a whirlwind. You and your husband feverishly tape boxes, load them up, he stacks them expertly in the truck… “The Tetris generation…” he laughs at the perfect and ever growing wall of cardboard. The feels like temperature climbs over 100 degrees, there’s a huge rainstorm to contend with, and no matter how much you pack, there’s always more.

Of those last 36 hours you and your husband spend 28 of them packing. Your body is absolotuely screaming. There is no point in your life where you have ever been more physical and your 42 year old self is aware of every muscle in your body… Your husband, who has had many a physical and demanding day working as an electrical contractor - in and out of 110 degree attics, slithering under houses, rolling out massive spools of wire… agrees.

By the time it’s all over, you’re both drained… physically, emotionally…

Your neighbors help you on the final stretch… your parents too when your cat slips out the door and disappears for hours… all the while time ticking down till the new owners come for their walkthrough… you have to leave after that. Now the stacking isn’t neat, it’s frantic.

And when you leave to pick up the kids from camp… your husband and neighbor still running back and forth to pack the truck and all those boxes… your husband tells you… “Everything might not make it into the truck…” You have less than an hour left and you scramble through the house grabbing your favorite plants and yard knickknacks… anything that you’d be upset about leaving you cram into the rental SUV.

When your time here is said and done you take a quick second at the front door… you peek into the house as you say, “Well house, it’s been one hell of a run… thank you for everything…” and then you close the front door one last time and run to the SUV where you painfully haul your batteredy body into the driver’s seat.

You sit amongst your family’s suitcases; your kids favorite stuffed animals they begged you to keep in the car; and a small, not quite complete collection, but rather a hastily curated jungle of potted plants. You’re thankful for the back up camera and blind spot monitors as you peer over Pothos and Snake plants and mounds of packed bags. Rocky your cat is in the back in a crate… Mom found him on the side of the house two hours before you had to leave… he had slipped out during the final packing wave and disappeared for the better part of the day… you cried and yelled for him running up and down the street… you were terrified he was gone for good… Now he meows pathetically from his crate. You hope he’ll settle down and he does, you soon learn that he’s a great travel buddy.

The last 36 hours have been emotional, physical, daunting and stressful. Your patience was stretched beyond thin and now it’s all over. You sigh, you wipe at watery eyes as you head to your children’s camp to pick them up… Tonight you have 300 miles ahead of you. Normally weary at the thought of a long drive, you’re now thankful for the time to sit… to let your body decompress…

First stop Georgia… then it’s on to Bryson City, NC to hang out for a few days, where you’ll pick up your best friend before heading to Virginia and eventually your new village… just in time for the walk through.

“Welp… at least the worst of all of this is behind me now…” former you thinks to herself. Current you laughs at the absurdity of the statement… “Oh just you wait…” current you chuckles… knowing full well what awaits you on this trek… “HA! Just you wait… this shit’s about to get REAL shitty.”

And boy did it ever… current you can laugh now… former you: not so much.

Our family with our former neighbors… we had the BEST neighbors ever. Love them all dearly.