Feelings on the Move

We're moving to Florida, quite officially by now, and the house in St. Louis is on the market. My emotions about this change almost by the minute, but can be summed up fairly well just by a sense of suddenness. When people ask me how I feel and I explain it in this way, they think that I mean that it hasn't sunk in yet. Oh, it has. And sometimes I feel sad or nostalgic or something else, but mostly just distant from it, in a way. And there's no sense in trying to approach it more closely, in dwelling in memories.

Am I even really moving? I've already moved out, after all, and this move has nothing to do with me. I won't really make friends or any sort of networks in Florida. I will go there for long months with just the family and I. And yes, it will be nice to go there in winter and spring break - it is the ultimate vacation destination, after all, and it almost seems wrong to move there permanantly.

But it is what it is. I'm clearing out my room. I get to keep most of my stuff, at least, the half that means something to me. Right now about 1/4th of my room is completely sterile and no longer mine. The "Miranda's Room" sign my Grandmother painted is gone, and my pictures are replaced by some strange paintings of jazz musicians Pam gave us to cover nail holes on the wall. Some of my furniture now stands completely empty, except for a handful of dust bunnies.

The rest of my room is getting there. Bookshelves stand half empty, the books getting loaded into laundry baskets to take away. I have a collection of crates to load everything I want to keep into. Most of them are for clothing, then there is one for electronics, one for movies and music, two for nostalgia... I know we oughtn't be defined by possessions, but that last category does tell a story... I attach memories to things easily, and seeing holiday cards, correspondances, accomplishments, events, vacations, schoolwork, and more packed into these crates reinforces this growing sense of finiteness.

I remember once playing a video game, and after so much work and striving and caring I realized how small my save game file was, how few variances there really were between my save game and all the others the game was made to generate. I experience this funny creeping feeling that these crates are my save game.

My second ever Facebook status is, "Miranda is scattering her posessions to the four winds. At least, it feels that way." So I guess the way I feel is windblown. It just seems like such a radical change, even though it affects me much less than the others. I do hope it will make my mom happy. :) The weather, if nothing else, should agree with her.

But the change, especially for me, seeing it through the window of a brief spring break, seems sudden and strange, and brings me face to face with finiteness.