10:01 p.m. - 2003-11-21
Goodbye
I lean over and close the door for the last time, and I sit staring at a blank screen that urges me to put into words the strange feeling of leaving my home behind. There are so many little things that it seems impossible that we could actually be moving tomorrow. Perhaps if I weren't sick, it would be easier. Perhaps if I had been participating in the frantic running around of the last few days it would seem more real. Or perhaps I am sick because we are leaving. I don't think so, because the symptoms are more of the "ridiculously stuffed up nose" and "endless hacking and dizziness" rather than the heartache and stomach butterflies I would expect to be associated with misery related illness, but I can't be sure. While I am not really miserable, I feel strange. I am stranger in my home, and it will never be home again.
My room, once cluttered with my things and decorated with my pictures, sits empty, only the bedding familiar. My bear sits on top, looking lonely, and I know how he feels. I think of the look on my cat's face this morning when we took her to the vet so she wouldn't be too upset by the movers, and I think that on some level she understood what was happening. I worry about her in the new house, about whether she will learn her way around and like it, or whether she will hide in the basement, afraid of the unfamiliar and hindered by her failing eyesight.
I look out the window and see the garden thick with fresh snow, and I remember the hours spent wrapped up in layers, using every snowflake from every inch of our huge yard to create our fort, and I know that there are others who will better appreciate this garden, full of hiding places and secret fortresses, but I don't want to leave it yet, because that means I have to accept the fact that I'm grown up. Part of me longs to go and crawl in behind the trees that formed a wall against the world despite the fact that I know I no longer fit there thanks to the general growing of both me and the trees.
I sit in front of our fireplace, our beautiful big brick fireplace, and I can't quite seem to wrap my head around the idea that our stockings will never hang there again. I close my eyes and I can see what our Christmas tree should look like, from my spot on the floor where I always lie to get the best view of the whole tree, squinting my eyes shut so that the lights sparkle just a little more, and I can't believe that isn't Christmas anymore.
There are so many other moments. That kiss in front of the fire so many years ago. Not the first kiss, but the first kiss that mattered. Eight years ago now, almost to the day. Or the first time I curled up in bed with Jamie and slept with his warm body up against mine and knew that this was something that was going to change my entire life. The hours we've spent in that room, planning our lives, falling in love.
How can I leave the house where I fell in love with the man I want to marry?
There are things I won't miss. Sharing a floor with my parents, tiptoeing around constantly because of their ludicrously early bedtime. Sharing a computer with them and being constantly heckled to get off in the middle of a conversation with someone because someone needs to check their email RIGHT THAT VERY INSTANT!
The driveway that seems to go on forever and takes even longer than that to shovel. The obnoxious neighbours with the bratty 18 year old boy who thinks he's really cool when he plays loud dumb music in the middle of the night. (Here's a hint: you aren't.) The garage door opener that only opens about half the time. The fact that Jamie and I need to whisper whenever we're in bed because the only time we get to be is after my parents go to bed. I'll have my own floor in the new house, one I'll share with only my cat, and I like that I'll be so much closer to her. I like that when I'm lonely, I can slip next door and be comforted by her warm body and her enthusiastic purring. I like that we'll have a second tv and a second fireplace in the basement, where Jamie and I can occasionally spend a moderately romantic evening without my parents clomping through every five minutes. I like the new deck, and the fact that the space is so much better distributed, and the fact that I'm three minutes closer to Jamie's house. I like that we're walking distance from the Dairy Queen for a hot summer's day treat, and I like that we have air conditioning (AIR CONDITIONING!) to retreat to when it's too hot even for a walk to Dairy Queen.
But that doesn't make it any less strange to be sitting here in a house full of boxes, surrounded by echoes of my past everywhere I turn. I can't escape them here. And it is strange to be leaving them all behind.
Goodbye, house. Keep my memories safe for me. I know I won't be able to remember them all, but I have faith that those I forget will stay locked in the comfort of your walls.
