Milking It For All It’s Worth

“Would you like to save $9.70 by applying for a Target Visa today?” The cashier says.

“No,” I say. “I already have one. We just moved and I can’t find it right now.” Which is true. Sort of. I do have a Target Visa. What isn’t true is that I do know where it is and we haven’t really just moved. But he doesn’t know that.

The cashier nods his head sympathetically. Everybody knows how it is to move. It sucks. Always. No matter what.

As I’m walking to the car I think about how many times I have offered the excuse in the past few months. I don’t even come up with a figure because my mind gets stuck on the “past few months” part. I quickly calculate that we moved approximately 3½ months ago. This makes me laugh and I wonder how long I can continue to use the excuse, “We just moved.”

The thing is it feels like we’ve just moved. No one’s really sure where everything is. There are still plenty of mystery boxes packed full of things I’ll probably never miss. Only half the curtains are hung, very few pictures are on the wall and the house is mostly knick-knack free. It has a transitional feeling that isn’t quite like home. And so I find myself offering the “we just moved” phrase as an explanation, a reason, an excuse for everything from having to buy something I already have or not being organized enough to call someone to finish the landscaping or not having enough time to do something. How can I do anything else when I’m in flux, when I’m not finished with this?

Perhaps it’s an introvert thing (my other great excuse) and the need to have the home environment under control before I can be psychologically comfortable enough to do anything else. Sometimes it feels like that and then I rush to get everything done. I drive the rest of my family insane as I tear around hanging curtains and pictures (usually haphazardly as I must get it done now! Apparently perfection is not part of the psychological comfort I desire) and unpack boxes of no special need. They hover silently behind me, not sure if it’s safe to lend a hand. I’m frenzied and on a mission. But soon, whatever room is done, or I’ve come upon an insurmountable obstacle and I stop. Just like that. Burned out. I am frustrated with the whole process and I don’t want to do it anymore. This usually lasts 3 or 4 weeks before the urge to frantic nesting strikes again.

Or perhaps moving from a home is more like ending a relationship. It’s not like in college when I moved every 6 to 12 months. I knew then it was all transitional and never really got too attached to the green shag carpeting and the harvest gold appliances. But when you buy a house it becomes yours not only by virtue of payment but by sweat equity and it’s harder to leave. These are the walls I painted, the floor I installed, the tree I planted, the deck I built and it all becomes part of you. When I moved into the house I had no plans to leave. I didn’t sign a lease that said 12 months from now I would be free to go. I entered into this relationship with the house not knowing where it would go or how long it would last. And even though it was time to go, the relationship had run its course, it’s still a change. A disruption. A new life. In this way, it’s not unlike a breakup. Maybe that’s why people always nod their heads and say ”ah, yes,” in the same way they do if you say you’ve just broken up with someone because really, it’s very similar.


So to return to my original question, how long can I continue to use the “we just moved” statement as an all-purpose explanation for anything and everything I deem appropriate (provided there is any shred of propriety left)?

The traditional answer to this question is, of course, the unpacked boxes equation. Using this as a guideline, I figure I have at least 3-4 more months of general use. This allows for a 10% non-unpacking rate for boxes that will never get unpacked but will be thrown into the garbage whole 8 years from now because I will have decided that whatever’s in there isn’t worth unpacking or keeping if I haven’t looked at it by then. This seems awfully short.

If I go by the introvert thing, I can probably use it for the remainder of the year because that’s how long it will take me to get the house to a reasonably settled state. That means all the curtains will be hung, pictures on the wall and every square inch of knick-knackable space will be appropriately knick-knacked. Not that the house will ever be done, because what fun would that be? But neither will it have that blank unpersonalitied look either. This takes me up to about 8 more months.

Finally, if I view it as a defunct relationship, am I allowed to use the rule of half? That is, it takes half the time you were in the relationship to get over the relationship. I’m even willing to allow for diminishing returns because I’m not sure that I can buy 10 years to get over a twenty year relationship. Who has time for that? Let’s just say it goes down percentage-wise by half approximately every 5 years after the first 5 which in this case means that the 9 ½ years I spent with this house should yield me about 2 years of mourning. Subtracting the 3 months I’ve already spent, I still have over 18 months in which to lament the fact that we have moved.

I like the sound of that. And who can blame me? Hey, we just moved.