A person, coincidentally a female, told me the other day I must feel very excited to be moving house soon.
Um, "excitement" is not the word that springs to mind for me. I just wish I could snap my fingers and I'd be wherever I am going to with whatever I need to take with me.
No house hunting.
No packing.
No removal van.
No unpacking.
No getting to the new house and hurting my back rearranging furniture until it is deemed to be in the best position possible.
Does this go with that? Does that go with this?
Is the "excitement" of moving house a Venus and Mars thing?
People from Venus enjoy moving planets but people from Mars would prefer to stay home, drink beer and watch the footy on TV?
Oh, I am as chuffed as anyone to finally sell our house. We have been here for eight years and it has served its purpose.
But it is too big. We are a family of three living in a double-storey house with five bedrooms. Do the maths: that means our cat has three spare rooms to spread herself around.
We put the house on the market last spring. One agent had it for seven months and we did not get one serious offer. We changed agents and within two days we had three people bidding for the house.
Now things are signed, sealed and nearly delivered.
We have to be out of here in about a month but we have not found a house to buy yet.
But I am not worried though. Yet.
For the time being, I am more concerned about an office move at work in the even nearer future.
Funnily enough though, I am not excited about that either.
We are moving to a new office in the same building but on a lower floor.
I think once we are there it will be good. I think we can have a darn good throw-out but still take the important stuff with us.
By important I mean our computers, our phones and our beer coasters.
But some of my workmates, coincidentally from Venus, think it's pretty important to take our whiteboard with us to.
I think I know why. When I started in the job I wrote my name and phone number on that board in the wrong pen and now it will not come off. My very kind workmates obviously don't want the new occupants of that room to know that:
Nevertheless, I took up their concerns with the boss's personal assistant.
"If I had a screwdriver, I am sure I could get it off the wall," I said.
"It might leave marks on the wall," she said.
Sheesh, now she tells me about marks on the wall!
Heck, how am I going to explain, especially to the people of Venus, the great flourishes of paint on the wall which say: "J.M. was here in 2004"?
Hey, they were the ones who suggested I should work myself into a state of excitement.
©June 30, 2004, John Martin. All Rights Reserved
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