Unpacking!

The moving truck, after multiple delays, finally arrived yesterday! Sadly, there was a lot of damage, and the moving company’s inexperienced movers wrapped a great deal of packing tape around most of my furniture, including nearly every wood piece, and it has marred or taken off the finish on many of them. My coffee table bit the dust, as did almost every cheaper piece of shelving or storage piece. Several of my lighter items were damaged beyond repair.

The good news is that my grandmother’s hutch, which I have “owned” for many years but until now, never had in my own home, arrived without a scratch. My massive oak desk, which is dominating my new little living room, has some surface damage but otherwise is okay. My beautiful upholstered chairs are fine, and very few of my dishes and such suffered any loss. My pictures all made it intact. My electronics are unhurt.

M is explaining to her grandma that she's still waiting for the movers to unload her chairs.
I am feeling quite overwhelmed by all of it. I’ve been attacking the boxes furiously since yesterday, because I know that I won’t be able to rest until there is some semblance of order – and a clear path to walk through. I have had most of the belongings that I kept when I left Colorado four years ago in storage all this time, and seeing my stuff has been weird; knowing how much I got rid of, I can’t believe what I kept. No one needs as much barware as I apparently at one time thought I needed. I have a box for Goodwill started already, which began with a couple of flowered china serving bowls that I think my mother must have given me at some point, from the collected remnants of relatives. They are awful – I didn’t remember having them in my possession.

It is strange how filthy cardboard boxes get, and how much packing material I am throwing away. One bathroom item exploded and got all over a lot of other things, despite how well it was wrapped. Fortunately, it smells better than just about anything I’ve ever bought, so if I have to keep discovering its residue, at least it’s not unpleasant. Putting my desk back together by myself was hard. My back is screaming, and I didn’t sleep well last night, despite my body’s desperate gratitude at finally being in my own bed again. I have yet to tackle my clothes or my papers, and I am a little daunted by all the infinitesimal decisions.

We’ve been camping out in this townhouse for two weeks, and I am deliriously happy to be through with that. Lots of little things are occurring to me as I unpack, and I will have more to say, but I wanted to put this out there before I get any farther along.

It feels bizarre to be touching every single thing I own in a systematic way. The past several years have been so busy and stressful, and now I have done a complete one-eighty and am contemplating each movement. My head is swimming with thoughts.