thoughts on moving

Friday 

 Our house remains a labyrinth of boxes and garbage bags. Navigating my way from the front door to the kitchen is surprisingly challenging and I am convinced that our possessions are multiplying while we sleep. We've got two days to pack up the house, but it looks like a month-long project at best. Nervous energy is beginning to creep up; I cannot imagine being ready to leave by Monday. I know it will come together somehow, though, because it must.

We're taking our sweet time to drive up. Two weeks setting up a swag in a different tiny town every night and watching the landscape change. I declared this the year of "explore", and this time next week we'll be exploring the classic Australian outback on our way to build a new life in a new city.

Monday

Everything has happened so quickly. I've been so caught up in the logistics of the move that it really only hit me yesterday that we are leaving. Claire drove away and I was left sobbing in the street, finally realising what our moving actually means. We're leaving everyone we love and we're building a new life in a new city. Skype can never replicate those nights at the pub with my best friend, those mornings where Claire would bustle around the kitchen making tea in her ugly mug after crashing on our couch. She was right, this is the end of an era. And though I know it is an exciting adventure that lies before us, right now I'm grieving all that I will lose.

It's a chilly morning, perhaps the last for a while, so I don't mind shivering a little as I sit outside and write this. I'm trying to bring back that excitement I felt twenty-four hours ago, but it's mixed with sadness finally and these last few hours are fraught with to-do's that I can't imagine being able to complete.

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I'll be out of internet range for most of the trip, so I doubt I'll be able to post until we are in our new Darwin home (assuming we have one by then). Follow me on Instagram to keep up with us as we trek across the desert.