Blue Folder

I have to confess something: I'm hiding out.  I'm avoiding packing tonight.  I'm pretending to do work in the basement while K is upstairs sorting, boxing, cleaning, working very hard I can imagine. I however, am totally acting like I'm doing all of that, occasionally calling up for more garbage bags. 

Its just really cold outside, and the dogs are asleep at my feet, and the blankets are just right, and there's so much good stuff on TV tonight.  And, I worked really hard this weekend and I'm pretty tired and I'll be doing all that packing stuff all day tomorrow and all week. 

Ok?
 


We are a week away from hitting the road.  The boxes are piling up and there are more empty spaces than occupied spaces as of now.  That's progress. That's exciting.  I know that we are at the beginning of two weeks of exhaustion.  Its expected with all big events.  We are starting to talk about what all this will feel like and what we're going to experience.  Its a heavy time.  It's an exciting time, but its heavy.  I'm surprised with how easily things find themselves in boxes.  How all my cookbooks fit into one box, how all the board games fit like a puzzle, how we know what we will need to take with us. 


A couple of weeks ago, we packed up K's old room, and found a blue folder.  I've seen this folder before, infact K brought it out the first night that I visited Harrisburg.  The folder is the sole result of a 12th grade boy who decided it would be a good idea to print off every email that he exchanged with me, despite whatever might happen to us in the future. 

Its such a juxtaposition to sit on a bed with boxes, reading old emails that you wrote to someone you thought you loved.  And to realize that, yes you did love him afterall. I wasn't just reading lovenotes though, I was reading the history of my teenage years.  The emails contained events that friends and I experienced, family tragedies like when my grandma died, and what I wanted my future to be like.

I wrote about that I was thinking about becoming a nurse.  And, here I am a nurse. 

I wrote, "I know you're going to become a priest, but Liza and Nettie think I'm going to marry you."  And, I did. 


We reconnected several years after those were composed and started the next round of emails.  These ones talked about seeing each other everyday, what it would be like to get pizza together on the East Coast, and sleep in on the West. 

We're doing those things too. 


Opening that blue folder, and reading those emails was eye-opening.  It showed me how fast life goes by.  How much things can change, and yet, how so many things about you stay exactly the same.  It made me realize how much we've accomplished. 

(And, oh, also how well I wrote at that age.  Correct grammar and spelling.  So different than how teenagers write. )


We're moving, but more than that, I'm returning home victorious.  I moved away from everything that I knew because I was very sure in my heart that K and I had something real.  We weren't engaged, we weren't sure that we would make it, we were awful at fighting, and there were so many uncertains.  But, part of me knew that this was right, and I knew enough about myself back then to listen. 

It does help to have the reminder in writing.