Moving.

Time to move. I wondered when this day would come, for awhile I seemed to be picking up and moving at least once or twice a year. The week of Thanksgiving in 2008, I moved into this not-so-humble abode in Kittery. I had to find a place ASAP, because I was starting back full time at the store for the holidays and there was no way I was moving back in with my parents. It was pretty slim pickings, so despite that it was way more space than I needed and more money than I wanted to spend on rent, I chose this 3-bedroom, somewhat awkwardly arranged, but overall huge and really nice condo in the shadow of the Piscataqua Bridge. A few months later, Johnny & I toasted on Valentine's Day to moving in together and taking that next step in our relationship. Two years later, we are giving up the place that became our first real home together, and giving up some of our freedom & independence, moving in with his Dad to save money, pay off debt, and get ourselves to where we want to be financially before entering into this little thing called marriage.


Not that anyone has implied I (we) should be, but I'm not ashamed at all to admit we're "moving in with our parents." In fact, I think anyone with half a brain would agree it's an extremely responsible, intelligent decision on our part. In case you haven't been paying attention for the last few years, the economy sucks, and it sucks even more if you're young and just starting out. I could launch into a rant, or whatever you may want to call it, about jobs, the credit crisis, big business and Wall Street sucking the life out of our economy/country, and all that good stuff, but I'll try to stay on topic for once. The fact of the matter is while we love our life and all that comes with it right now, we like many Americans, live paycheck to paycheck, week to week, month to month. Every time I build up my personal savings, I manage to either add to my debt, or have something come up that dips into, maybe even drains the savings account. Johnny has student loans, and shockingly, doesn't want to still be paying them off when we send our kids to college and they have to face the same reality. We would like to buy a house some day, hopefully in the not too distant future, and not on 5% or some other ridiculous measly percentage down. We would also like to have kids. Preferably while we're still young enough to keep up with them. I'd actually like to have about 4 or 5. (I'm still not over my only child complex.) Whether that will happen remains to be seen, but neither one of us wants to bring children into the world not knowing whether or not we're going to be struggling to feed, cloth, educate, and maybe give them a few luxuries here and there in their life.


This is a temporary thing. We're not giving up on supporting ourselves by any means, we just needed to figure out a way to get ahead - or we never would. I know too many people who live or have lived that way. I grew up pretty comfortable, even when my family was struggling, I never really knew it as a child. The same was true for Johnny. We want to give our children that same sense of comfort and security, and we want them to be able to be either superstar soccer players or gymnasts if they want to, be on the traveling team, take private voice or piano or some other ridiculous instrument lessons, bring cupcakes to class on their birthday, go to summer camp, go on vacations to cool places, and go to Harvard if they want to. We also want stuff for ourselves. We want to travel. We want nice things, who doesn't? We don't want to worry about who is going to pay for what. I don't want to be one of those people who feels like they can never catch a break. Because you know why some people can never catch a break? Because they can't. They can't ever quite get ahead. They can't ever quite put enough aside that when disaster strikes there's still something left over. They can't say no to things they should, and they don't, and they never, ever will get ahead. I may not be that great at saying no to things either, but I am good at figuring out what I need to do so I don't have to say no, at least not all the time.


On Thursday we got a call at 8 o'clock that our landlord wanted to show the place the next day. All afternoon. Thanks for the notice! We are in the process of moving and of course the place is a disaster. So we were up half the night and then both missed some or all of work yesterday to get this place in order for the showings. It was incredibly annoying, inconvenient, and stressful, but it kind of kicked us into high gear moving mode. As I sit in what was supposed to be my "office" - we moved around a bunch of stuff and changed the layout a few months ago, then never really got down to organizing or cleaning so that it might actually happen - I am feeling a little nostalgic about leaving this place. It is (has become) our home, and now that's it's so clean, it seems a lot nicer. But living here, we both felt like we could never get out from under it. The utilities alone for such a large condo were killing us. This place was our life -- literally -- most everything we earned went into paying the bills and maintaining this house. We couldn't take vacations, we couldn't buy things or treat ourselves to things we really wanted (without feeling guilty), and we couldn't make any major strides in terms of paying off debt. We had no money of our own saved toward our wedding, honeymoon, the house, or the future we hope to have together. Honestly, is any house or condo or apartment worth giving up everything else life has to offer to live there?


I don't think living with Johnny's dad will be easy. I mean, we will essentially be permanent guests in someone else's house. We have to find places to store all of our things and furniture that can't fit into our one bedroom. I'm sacrificing the beautiful masterpiece that is my walk-in closet (plus a spare one for my out of season items) for a single shared closet maybe 1/5 of the size. Mr. Rudy will certainly have a different life, as his frequent relapses in potty training and other occasional naughty behavior mean he'll have to be crated whenever someone is not home. There will be many other sacrifices and probably some awkward moments I can't foresee (not that I don't like my future father-in-law, you just know these things happen), but I know I care more about the results of making these changes to our life, and the future sacrifices we hopefully won't have to make because we did this now. I think we're making a good, sound, mature decision, and I think it's a good sign of our potential to have a successful marriage that we were able to make this decision together, that we are willing to compromise and make sacrifices for each other, and that we are following through on a plan of action to get what we want out of life.


Now I must start packing like a mad woman, because Lucy will be here within a matter of hours, Easter is tomorrow, and next Saturday I desperately want to go to Boston to a bridal event, so I've got to get 'er done! Did I mention packing is one of my most loathed activities and weakest skills????

I think I shall miss my closet the most.