moving

This afternoon, I found myself sitting on the daybed of (my friend) Robyn's 7-year-old, sharing a sandwich and salad with Robyn and surrounded by taped-up boxes. There were boxes in place of the kitchen table, boxes on the couch cushions, tape and scissors in each room. Odd, isn't it, how moving seems to displace everything in such a way that you find yourself doing very funny things? Eating lunch on your 7-year-old's daybed, sleeping on a mattress in the livingroom, unpacking toys from a box on your kitchen floor, finding the kitchen dishes in a box in the bathroom....

I have relocated every two or three of my twenty-three years. This month, I find myself at the other end, in the unwelcome position of being the one to send my friends off....not the one to be sent. First to go was Abby, leaving Orem for (first Japan and then) Florida. Every time I think about "going north to see Abby", I get a little pang of heartache remembering that Abby isn't north anymore! And on the 14th, two of my dearest friends, Robyn and Camilla, will leave--one for Richfield, Utah, and one for Flagstaff, Arizona. I already feel lost, and being at the other end of relocation this time, I'm feeling antsy to relocate. Thinking that somehow, if I'm leaving, too, then it won't matter that I'll be lonely. (Because I planned it.) As if life's difficulties are easier when you plan them....silly notion. They're still hard. You just get a chance to prepare. If your preparations make it easier, great. But the difficulty is still there. I sound bitter, don't I? I'm not. I'm sad.