The Move

The Move

The summer of 2009 was a blur. I was finishing a job and carefully preparing it for somebody else. It was an emotional farewell, saying goodbye to my work with the wonderful people of the Indiana Conference of United Methodist Churches. I had poured my heart into it for 8 ½ years. Our final Annual Conference was a mix of joy & sadness, followed by an accident that totaled our car. Through this we had to help our daughter, Rae Lynne’s, family get their house ready to sell, packed, loaded and moved to Michigan. It was exhausting. We returned to Indiana with four days to ready for a sale in which we would sell about 2/3 of our household goods. And after the sale we would have 5 days to pack and leave for Kentucky.
Somehow one’s belongings don’t look so good splayed out on tables and the drive and the yard. It’s really a pathetic looking site, looking at one’s life laid out for sale. It was sometimes painful, but we were probably too tired to appreciate the immensity of what we were doing. We gave the kids what they wanted & could fit in their homes & sold the rest. It was just stuff, but it was ‘our stuff’ and our life being dickered over and carted away in other people’s trunks. I thank God for my friend, Paula, who helped sort, haul, stack, price, & sell our stuff. And John & Nancy who brought food and then bought some things, & Marge & Dave who helped through it all. The sale was very successful , what was left went to the local homeless shelter, and the remaining goods were just about right for our much smaller home in Kentucky. In the end, downsizing this much had a rather freeing effect. And if we ever move back to our Logansport home we’ll have to buy new furniture….not all that bad of an idea!
After the sale, we had five days to pack all the goods we were moving to Kentucky. It was a marathon and ran late on several nights. We found french fry boxes from Mc Donalds were just the perfect size. Thanks to Karen, Marge, Rachelle, & Bonnie we got the household packing done. If I never hear the sound of ripping packing tape again in my life I’ll be happy.