in my adult life (and i start counting with my first marriage) i have moved 15 times. the one on sunday will be my 16th.
in my childhood, i moved...........once.
i remember that childhood move. i remember the first night in the new house and how, with this super mean scowl on my face, i kicked the bathtub. hard. because i thought it was a stupid bathtub. and a stupid house.
in other words, i was scared.
i was scared that even though my friends were only a few blocks away, i would never see them again. i was scared because the stairs to the basement were open. and i thought i would fall through.
i was scared of breaking something in this stupid new house and getting into all kinds of trouble for it. who cared if i broke something in the old house - it was an old house! and we were leaving it!
i was scared that my parents would make me do a bunch of stupid chores in a big stupid house on a saturday morning when i would rather be sleeping. or writing in my diary about it.
but, none of those things happened (well, except for the stupid chores, dang it) and i grew up relatively unscathed by having moved to a stupid house just a few blocks away from my non-stupid house.
and i never thought any more about it.
until now.
you might think that moving (for the 16th time - 17th if you count the childhood move to the stupid house - and 25th if you count the moves during college and grad school) would be old hat for me by now. and, in some ways, i guess, it is. i know how to pack. i know how to organize a move. i still don't know how to carry heavy boxes. nor do i want to learn. :)
but what never seems to become old hat - at least not for me - are the feelings associated with a move. they're not always scary, like that first one was, but there's always something emotional about them - because there's always something you're leaving behind.
this time, i am leaving behind more than i ever have before: i am leaving 5 grandchildren.
i have left my daughter and son-in-law before and i have left my parents before. i have left friends before. i have left jobs.
i have left houses that i loved (yes, even the stupid one which, by the end of the summer of that fateful move, i had grown to love).
i have left really cool kitchens.
i have left homes with exposed brick and giant arching windows that look out over the skyline of columbus.
i have left neighbors who waved hello to me on the first nice day of spring, in their shorts and flip-flops.
i have left the security that comes from having lived in one place long enough to have put down roots. yes, roots can be put down, even if you move 25 times.
and so, i have a history of having left. a lot. i think everyone does. but i am not sure that everyone has a history of gaining even more. or, at least, of realizing that they have.
i realize that i have.
i realize that in the aftermath of the worst thing that has ever happened to me, God waved His hand and fixed it.
He fixed it in a way that i never imagined He would do nor did i even want Him to do. i did not want God to ever ever ever in a million years let me fall in love again. please, God, if you love me even a little, don't do that.
but, ha, God and His sneaky little ways. you know?
and God's math, i realize, is much better than mine (although i know that's not saying a lot)........
and He says 16 has always been His favorite number.
but what He says mostly is,
you can stop counting now, nancy.
