Abundance in drought.

Waiting, waiting.

Pressure builds.

You'd think eventually the top would pop off.

Sides are threatening to explode at their seams.

Seams that I didn't know where there until their strength was tested.

Surely there can't be anymore room?

But there is. Always, it seems.

I don't know from where it all comes.

It's like someone put an undetectable extension charm on my life.

I don't care so much that no one else can detect it, but it'd be nice if I could sometimes. Save me a lot of grief.

But then where would be the room for grace?

If there was infinite space and I knew it, grace wouldn't find a hole big enough to inhabit.

But with all crevices stuffed to their limits, grace multiplies.

It abounds.

...and here's where I quote "Rawhide."

I still got it.

What is it I still have? (Other than a propensity to abandon formal grammar on occasion?)

Packing skills. Relocation packing skills. specifically.

After talking about it for a long time, my family and I are preparing to move. "Somethin's gotta give" has been our desperate prayer for a while, and as nothing has shown an inclination to give for a few months now, it has been made clear to us that it's time to go somewhere else. The place we are living is the largest contributor to our burden. Our time here was blessed for a while - a long while - but it seems pretty clear now that it's time to move on.

We've been in this house for 3 years and 5 months. My brothers and I have never lived anywhere nearly that long before. After being stationary for such a time, as I prepared to start packing a box, I momentarily wondered if I would have to pack and repack it a few times to figure out how to use its space most efficiently. For those who don't know, packing is a skill. Like most skills it becomes (and stays) more refined with practice. Aside from my frequent weekend trips and summers at camp, my packing skills have not been used in years.

But as it turns out, in this case at least, packing is like riding bike. I shuffled the contents of the box ever so slightly as I was putting them in, but I mostly just looked at the box, looked at my junk, and my brain keenly deduced how to best fill the former with the latter. Thank goodness.

Where and when we're moving we do not yet know. But this isn't the first time we've blindly packed, nor do I expect it to be the last. I do expect this to be the last family move that we make. My parents are keen to relocate somewhere else as soon as they can, and my brother and I are both keen to stay in this area (as well as live by ourselves :) ). Until my parents are ready to do that, though, we need to reduce and simplify. So once more we shall find another place to live together, and fondly think back on all of the wandering memories we've made while making one last set of new ones.

So now I sift through my belongings, deciding what to pack and what to relinquish from my possession. Can you guess what are the only things I've packed so far? Books. What do I still have a lot left to pack? Books. Counting all of my possessions, what makes up the majority of what I own and have to pack? Books. What makes up the majority of what I've decided to get rid of? Books.

So I guess one day if I ever am truly poor and have nothing to eat, I'll have plenty of paper to satisfy me.

But that comment spawns another post altogether....