Day 19 NaBloPoMo at yeah write guest blogger: Gina Freyn
Changing anything can scary, even little things. Changing big things is downright frightening more often than not. So the decision to dramatically downsize our lives without knowing where we’re headed has me feeling tentative, a little bit afraid and definitely nervous.
The busiest part will be whipping the house into shipshape selling condition by early spring. For me, the scariest part will be leaving the security of a place we’ve called home for the last 21 years and the thought that we’ll never replicate its warmth somewhere else. The hardest part will be deciding the fate of stuff lovingly and painstakingly hoarded for 25 years. Because then, how will we define our home if not by it’s red brick and mortar, belongings and smells?
Thankfully, we’re both relatively easy going. We’ve discussed and negotiated most things already (“You need to get rid of some books,” says he. “We’ll see,” says me). We’ve compromised (“This couch goes.” “The dog stays.”) But still, how do you scale down something that’s taken so many years to build?
You do what we did and chicken out. We decided to displace our shit (only for the foreseeable future and only because someday someone might need and outdated coffee table from my bachelorette days) by buying a storage condo. It’s convenient location dangles between two Amish enclaves just off Highway 6 in North Central Indiana and the town’s welcome sign says, “Ladies Day Extravaganza at ACE!” (Made this lifelong city girl smile). Camouflage-wear from Farm and Fleet is en vogue right now and the sound of gunshots act as the morning alarm clocks because it’s duck season for a few more weeks I’m told.
We’re still far apart in terms of where we’ll drop our middle-aged roots next summer once we sell the house. I have no idea even when we’ll agree but this storage condo, in a town that’s remained constant in our lives when things in the past felt unsettled, is a decision that feels right to both of us. It’s a start. And an unexpected and added bonus is its generator plug, drainpipe and water line. So if we ever decide to pull an RV into the storage condo and live in it, we can. Because that’s what the previous owners did!
Isn’t “home” just a label anyway? It’s not things. It’s where the people you love who love you back live. It can be any place we find comfort and support like Yeah Write where we practice downsizing our writing until we feel good about what’s left. Just like this post, which started out as 750 words on a blank page.
Simpler, less cluttered, is better. At least it is for me.
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I have lived an average of 2.8 years in my entire lifetime and I’m not even a senior citizen yet. When we were young we moved house often, depending on where my mother’s office assigned her. I’ve learned that home is truly what you make it, where you make it, and you can re-create it anywhere, anytime.