Disclaimer: This post may be extremely boring. But if you like before and after shots, this post is for you.
My husband and I will be moving to Melbourne in October, so I’ve taken it upon myself to declutter the house, which is an activity I’m very well known for. The prospect of getting rid of as much as possible before leaving has filled me with the utmost excitement, and documenting the progress will make me all but forget about my nerves which will get progressively stronger as the months go on.
The Before and After Shots
The first thing I got to at the start of January is to sort out our bedroom linen. This has been on my to-do list forever. We have electric blankets, sheets, duvets and duvet covers that don't fit our bed. So why on earth are we keeping them? This task was so much harder than I expected, because although I can look up size dimensions (queen vs king), measuring something that extends the more you pull it means plonking a tape measure down on it can mean the difference between 118cm and 223cm. And both are kings!
Anyway, this task took several days as there was one duvet that I was pretty sure was a king, but the only way to be sure was to put it inside our current duvet cover and see if it fit. And everyone knows changing bed linen is one of the worst chores. So, I procrastinated a week on that, and got there in the end. Here’s the before and after lists. We gave away anything we weren’t taking with us or didn’t fit. Special shout out to Rebekah, who volunteered to drop stuff off at the Salvation Army during a week I just wasn't coping with.
For Christmas, I used the money I received from my mom-in-law to buy the jewellery hanger you seen the second photo (which I adore). Before this, literally all my necklaces lived in a plastic packet, which you can almost see in the first photo, sitting on top of the orange shoebox. I managed to empty the packet completely, giving away bits and pieces I didn’t like. The added bonus of the jewellery hanger is that I remember it exists… and therefore, wear necklaces more often!
At some point, I’ll dedicate a day to cleaning up my part of this gaming shelving. Kyle’s part is the neatly displayed part. My part is the messy part (bottom-right). Legal papers and what not. But I have made a start by getting rid of things I don’t need a digital copy of, and that’s my ring-bound notebooks. It’s a small, easy thing, but they took up noticeable room.
My next mission was the spare room. We always planned to turn this into a guest bedroom for when drunk friends come to crash, but we never quite got around to it. Instead, it become the temporary room for several bits ‘n bobs and the permanent home of our beanbags. Around mid-January, however, this room started being used as our podcast room, which meant my organized mess had to be moved out. Although logically, this was good news because we want to trial podcasting scenarios for when we move, it meant any before and after shots wouldn’t work. It also meant I was forced to be a bit more flexible with my process. What I got in the end though is the comparison photo I’m most proud of.
Fingers crossed, that wall will be devoid of shelves by the end of February.
The credit for the shot below goes entirely to Kyle, who cleaned out the left hanger area of this wardrobe. He bravely gave away half the jackets hanging on his side, including the leather ones in the “after” shot which are currently listed on Trade Me, still hoping to sell. I was suitably impressed with him. Next mission, that top shelf of CRAP.
The Personal
Starting New Year’s Day, Kyle and myself have had informal meetings at least once a week about Melbourne, covering mostly logistics for my benefit. These have been great, because it’s kept us on the same page as each other, as our plans and ideas have evolved over the months.
In between these meetings, I’ve brought things to Kyle that have been on my mind both big and small. There’s at least nine months to go, so my emotions are nowhere near roller coaster level.
There’s a picture I have in my mind about things I know “in theory” and things I can feel and understand. Water can rest on top of a leaf without being absorbed by it. This is my brain understanding a theory of how a thing is.
Usually, in this state, truths and “knowing things in theory” are just words that I can parrot back but their meaning and implications rarely sink in. But when they do, it becomes like a droplet on a tissue. Absorbed. This process happens gradually or all at once.
It happened all at once early in January when I learnt that there was no BurgerFuel in Melbourne. In theory, I knew there’d be different takeaway places and some of these places just have different names. But the fact that my favourite takeaway place simply wouldn’t exist in my new home kind of shook me. As a result, I’ve been doing a lot of journaling this month.
The realities of home sickness really sunk in when I had lunch with mom this month. She was honest about what it feels like and what kind of things I might expect. After all, moving from South Africa to New Zealand was a much bigger culture shock than it will be for me to move to Australia. A smidgeon panicked, the first thing I did when I got back to work was research how to cope with homesickness, where I found this fantastic list. I also talked about it extensively with Kyle that night. My mom had chosen not to tell dad she was suffering from home sickness (which only kicked in after three years for her), and after sharing this story with my husband, we both agreed there’s no way we were going to pretend either one of us wasn’t struggling. We both know the move will be harder on me than him, and he’s more than happy to be my rock. <3
Another thing I discussed was how we’d fare “bio-psyco-social-spiritual”ly (a term I picked up from Anatomy of Marriage). And although we don’t have a way to know what kind of things we’ll personally struggle with when moving to a big city, we both agreed that we’d be conscious of our connectivity with each other, and make sure we activity seek to maintain our currently level of connection.
I’ve also spent a lot of brain energy coming up with ways to make sure my left-behind friends don’t feel like I’m abandoning them. Having been on the other side of a friend leaving, I already had my droplet of water fully absorbed by my brain tissue (haha). One of the things I wrote in my journal after coming back from our November Melbourne visit is that the city is distracting. At the time, it allowed me to completely understand how one could forget to send a message home, or start to think long-distance friends don’t miss you quite as much because the current reality feels so far removed from how things used to be. Slowly, this realisation is reverting back to a ‘theory’, which is exactly why I wrote it down, so I don’t forget. I’m getting birthday presents organized early and have already mentally organised how to keep in contact with specific people in a way that’s meaningful to them. It’s my responsibility not to get negligent. October, specifically, is full of birthdays. So, I need to make sure everyone is catered for well before the busiest month of 2020.
And finally, for those who REALLY like before and after photos, not matter how little has changed
(You'll recognize a lot of things that were on the spare room shelf are now on this shelf. However, they've replaced items that were on this book shelf. So I'm not cheating. Ahhh.... Although I just realised the shelf actually has more books on it than at the beginning of the month. Woopsie!)
(I intend to get into this top shelf in February, as it's filled with clothes I nearly never wear...)
(I'm very excited about getting stuck into this. There's so much here to easily throw away, with the added motivation of ants recently invading. And since my husband reads this blog (and didn't know about the ants) I wouldn't be surprised if he went gung-ho at the ants before I even get in there (and might throw away some stuff in the meant time. Hint hint)
