Finally Going Home

Today I started packing.  About 7 months ago, I moved in with one of my best friends knowing that in less than a year I would be married and moving out.  With the closing date a little over a month away, I decided in my free Sunday afternoon, I would pack the first box.  It's amazing how fast the last seven months have gone.  Looking back, even December sometimes feels like a million miles away, but packing that box was a strange sense of deja vue and I realized I could remember all those times I packed up to move to the next place. Like most people my age, moving has become a regular thing over the last dozen years.  My first move was at age 9, again at age 14, again at 18, and so on and so forth.  I've lived in eight different places since high school.  Sometimes for only a few months, sometimes for a few years.  But as I plan this move there is a sense of relief... this home will be my real home... In college, houses were temporary.  The dorms felt like closets with beds, the sorority was busy and always changing.  My parents house, is, well, my parents, and it hasn't felt like my home since I went to college.  I've lived with other family members, friends, at my school, in a mansion, in China.... but I've never once owned my own space.  But in 44 days, I will get the keys to my home.  MY HOME.  For the first few months, I will be occupying the house alone as Chris finishes his lease out at his apartment.  Then it will be our space.  It's like everything we worked for is finally coming together.

There is something a little more exciting about this move.  It is so much bigger than transition, the next step, etc.  This time, my move means I am starting the beginning of my life with my best friend.  I picture that first day when I take our set of keys and put them in the front door.  I will set my bags down, and for the first time, it will be my space.  I will control the air temperature, when the dishes and laundry are done, where to place the furniture, how the grass is mowed, what color flowers to plant, etc etc etc.  And while I know a huge amount of responsibility is going to come with owning such a big house, there is this secret spot in me that is absolutely giddy.

When I was about 5, I started collecting Little Tikes doll houses.  First, I got the blue roofed family house complete with the furniture, a van, a family, and working closet under the stairs.  The kitchen had a deck that pulled out and a dangling kitchen light.  The mattresses were made of this yellow foam and I would cover them with colored Kleenex to look like sheets.  For my next birthday, I got the pink roofed grandparent's house. It was a bit smaller (as there were only two residents and the family cat) but it contained more furniture.  Next, I saved up my money for the stable.  It was a mint green roofed barn with horses, fences, and riders.  Combined with all of my other small figurines, I began to create a city of families.  I set them all up under my loft bed and played for hours with the light from a desk lamp.  I think sometimes I got lost in pulling all of the toys out of the buildings and then putting them back in.  I made up stories about life and some how in my own little world I felt this sense of joy and excitement in all of the possibilities these tiny houses had to offer.

I still think about that as I am completing the registries, picking out furniture and appliances, and driving by the house on Salem Drive.  There are so many possibilities, so many choices, and for once, I get to plan it all out (with my future hubby of course).  So much has changed in the last 30 days.  One month ago, I could barely breathe, and now I feel life has become almost magical.  I know it won't always feel this way, so I am trying to enjoy it.  I feel like I am finally going home... to my real home... the one I always dreamed about....