Moving from place to place, I realize that there is a lot of emotional baggage that I’ve unpacked and left behind. Numerous are the moments that prodded the emotional pits of my heart and mind. Sofa surfing was a challenge in humility; learning how to gracefully accept charity and help from others. Such a thing may be easy for some people but not for me. I detest relying on others since I’ve endured life lessons that taught me the value of self-reliance. I also don’t enjoy the feeling of being indebted to people. Discomfort brims when I know that someone has control over me.
The biggest piece of luggage in that situation was that of a friend who offered to store my belongings until I moved to Hawaii. In a flurry of frenetic movement, I managed to get my stuff from Brooklyn to her place in the Bronx. The original intention was that I’d stay there but I did not feel comfortable doing so after witnessing no less than three completed drug deals in the short time it took to carry my belongings into the apartment. I didn’t feel safe. What ended up happening was a combination of poor logistics and an inability to get things done faster. I intended to go through my stuff, trash or donate, and then ship everything to Honolulu. In my mind, this entire orchestration would only take a day. In reality, it took nearly two months.
During that time, my schedule was overloaded with meetings and road trips for more meetings. I was out of town for the last half of June, part of July, and some of August. When I was in the city, my days were full of meetings with teachers, education organizations, global institutions, related corporate groups, and anyone else who would listen to my pipedream. What this meant was that there was little time to dedicate an unadulterated day to the matter of unpacking, evaluating, and shipping my stuff. Mix in the fact that the subway ride from the sofa I surfed in Brooklyn to the location of my stuff in the Bronx clocked in at about an hour. I often worried that I’d miss a callback while underground for the sojourn.
The looming task of addressing my stuff (and that’s all it really was: stuff) weighed on my psyche. Not only did I dread having to assess and deal with the rigmarole of packing and shipping, but I felt the heaviness of my reliance upon my friend. Although she constantly assured me that she was never home and that it was cool to leave my stuff there, I felt the opposite. Over time, she just stopped talking to me.
Given our conflicting schedules, I chose a few solid dates to go to her place during business hours. Upon entering her apartment, I was confronted with by a stack of boxes, plastic containers, miscellany, and two footlockers; the collection of my life in the last six years. In a cumulative four-day strategy, I sorted, trashed, and repacked what needed to be shipped. Beneath a sign that read “FREE,” I set a large sack of usable goods near the front entrance to my friend’s apartment complex. The bag and the sign disappeared within five minutes. A wave of relief washed over me.
Moving and shipping without a car is an abominable task that tests one’s wits and willpower. In the steamy New York summer heat, I managed to pack and walk two small boxes, two medium boxes, and a footlocker to the U.S. post office located just over a quarter-mile away. The silver lining of this bootleg operation is that I didn’t need to go to the gym; my biceps and quads were toning up and I was losing a significant amount of water weight. Even after four hours of manual labor, I still had two large boxes, one footlocker, and a box of items which begged the question, “Keep or Trash?” Fortunately, a kind friend with a car offered to help me wheel these last items to the post office, saving me from throwing my back out before age 30.
Originally perceived as a mere physical nuisance, I was surprised by how much this ordeal affected my psyche. While sorting and packing, I felt lonely among the piles of inanimate objects; the city is full of transients without families. While shipping my stuff at the post office, I felt uncertain and unstable about the future. My attempt to ship the first footlocker highlighted a myriad of feelings which had been buried in the pile of stuff once stuck in my friend’s apartment:
“You want to ship that?” said the woman at the post office, pointing at my bright orange footlocker. She lowered her chin so she could look at me over the tops of her wire-rimmed glasses.
“Yes, I’d like to ship it, please,” I said timidly. I felt sweat drip down my back, disappearing into the waistband of my spandex shorts usually reserved for gym workouts.
“Really?” she questioned, her chin dropped lower. “You know you have to have it wrapped in brown paper and you don’t even have a lock on it.” She turned and had a chuckle with her co-worker in the neighboring service window. I explained that my mother had called to check on the matter and that she was told that such an item could be shipped.
Through the holes in the service window, I could hear her remarks about how “ridiculous” the whole thing was and how she had “never seen anybody tryna send a trunk!” Comments of general disgust were exchanged between co-workers. After a colorful phone conversation with the manager of the main Bronx post office, my gatekeeper reluctantly agreed to take my footlocker. “I’m going to buzz you into the side door. I want you to roll it in and then get out,” she barked. Under her breath, I heard her whisper how she “ain’t gonna throw out my back for no trunk.” The sweat continued to drip, gluing my t-shirt to the small of my back. The air conditioning bore down on me and I felt oddly naked.
When finally asked for the destination city, I replied and then she glared at me over the tops of her glasses to ask, “Hawaii? That’s far. Are you moving?” And there it was: a reality check.
I stood for what seemed like a solid minute, peering through the glass window at this person who boldly questioned my course of action. Her query highlighted the magnitude of my decision to move as well as my initial inability to confront my decision. “Yes,” I replied. “I am moving.”
I discovered the psychological reason for leaving my stuff at my friend’s place for so long was my unwillingness to uproot the last piece of twine that tied me to New York. By this time, I had already quit my job and moved out of my Brooklyn apartment. All that was left to ground me in New York was that pile of stuff. Yet with that very stuff now en route to Far, Far Away, there was no physical evidence that I lived in New York. For a second time in my life, I became rootless once more.
Part of what I think makes the act of moving so emotional is that you are in a state of flux. You have just left that which you know and you are headed towards another existence which you can only envision until you have arrived. Even then, the settlement period is fresh and uncertain; stability forming only from repetitious practice. Good friends will tell you that I court flux. They’ll tell you that I freely change my mind and my geographic location, often making it difficult to create things like dinner plans or nights on the town. Fluidity does have specific implications.
Still, the act of changing reservations an hour before dinner falls short of the magnitude of redirecting one’s life. For the last four months, I have been in a personal and professional state of flux, inching my way towards some destination (a murky construction) and constantly evaluating each decision made. Leaving New York and the east coast was to leave the life I’ve known for the last six formative years. Though headed towards familiar shores, I do not know what’s in store. The same can be said for my entrepreneurial pipedream.
Though unafraid, I often feel like I’m standing in a San Franciscan fog: I know where I am but I have limited visibility as to what is ahead of me. All I can say is that there will be stories to tell.
I have a habit of pre-empting the alarm on my mobile phone. There’s a feeling that begins to stir my toes and fingertips, working its way up until it swirls into my dream. I’m not sure what triggers this corporeal recognition that I need to wake up but something sparks it and then, eyes open. I’m awake.
For the blade of the paddle, I cut off half of Box #2 once it was deconstructed. In the corners, I snipped out square pieces to allow the cardboard to fold with greater ease. When I finished, I took the contraption over to the agent who commented on my use (or perhaps abuse) of the FRAGILE tape before taping the baggage claim sticker to the eyesore.
