How to Move....Again

I could write a big long post here about all the why's I have in regard to all the moving, but does it really matter? No. I don't think it does.

Seriously. I have moved a lot! I thought it had just been since I got married but I was thinking back and it's really been since I graduated from high school.

1. Hawaii(3 months)
2. Philippines (3 months)
3. George Fox University (1 year) (home for summer)
4. Biola University (3 years) (home for summers)
5. Portland, OR/ Western Seminary apt. 1
6. apt. 2
7. apt. 3
8. apt. 4 (in a span of 3 years)
9. Moved in with my parents while we waited for our house to be built (6 months)
10. Our first house! Shelton, WA (4 years)
11. Moved in with Rand's Dad in Phoenix while we waited for said house to sell (6months)
12. Peoria, AZ (first rental) (1 year)
13. Conference Center in Valley Forge, PA (1 month)(temp. housing while we looked for a place to live)
14. Audubon, PA (1 year 2 months) (second rental)
15. Phoenix, AZ (8months)(current)
16. Next week we move again. 2nd purchased home. Phoenix, AZ (LORD willing)

Rand and I are packing for our 12th move together. 12! 12!! You'd think we would be moving experts by now...or that we would have gotten rid of a lot more of our junk by now. Every time feels just like the first time...okay maybe not the first time, but at least the 7th (#11 on the list). It is just plain hard. Rand and I have the same fights, I mean discussions.:) He is pushing me too fast, or he is throwing away things I want to keep, or he wants to hang a picture where I don't like it, etc, etc. We are getting better at that. I close my eyes and let him go and every once in a while I look through the garbage and pull a couple things out, and then I let him decide where to hang a picture or a clock and if I really can't live with it a week down the road, I just move it myself when he's at work and see if he likes it later. See? You learn things as you go. The packing is the worst. The unpacking is the worst too. I throw up my hands a lot and say, "I just can't do it. It's too much. It's too big!" And Rand, well he just does it. He's really good, really.

How do I do it? (I get asked that all the time) I don't have a choice. That's how. Every move we've made has been out of necessity. We go for a job, or we move because we can't afford the new higher rent, or we get laid off, or someone doesn't pay their mortgage and that leaves us without a house. You know, that kind of stuff. What can you do but roll with it?

We do it because we have to and it gets done only because I married a really hard worker, non-procrastinator (thank goodness!!!)

For me, it's hard. I don't do well with upheaval (the stage of moving we are in right now). And then it takes me a really long time to find my rhythm again. Way longer than most people I think. It took me about a year to feel "normal" after we moved to Pennsylvania. Would have been nice to stay and actually live in that "normal" feeling/state. Now we are here and I haven't found it yet. Soon I think. A home of our own should help.

Deep breath. Pack a box. Imagine a new home. Get excited about only the positives. Procrastinate a little, hoping it will get done somehow anyway. Throw a little fit. Pray. Collapse in exhaustion. Get behind on everything else. Come face to face with all your failures as a homemaker wanna be. Pack a box. Throw some things away. Vow to do better. Curse moving and dreams that haven't come true. Re-think of all the positives. Pray and breathe.

That's how you move....again.