BoomerGirl Diary

The line at the liquor store was about six people deep, and I was number seven. Meanwhile my mom was carrying hollowed-out liquor and wine boxes to my car (a hot commodity this time of year). Once I reached the register, the lethargic clerk checking me (and my large bottle of bourbon) out, mumbles, “havin’ a pahrtè?”

I looked away from him and over to my mom who was trying to get four large boxes (when she should have only tried for three) out a dying automatic door. I replied, “No. I’m moving.”

My annual move has come again. Since arriving in Lawrence, Kan., in 2002, I have packed my tiny life to relocate across town (or campus) five times, this being the sixth. Unlike the five moves prior, my mom has flown in from Colorado to help, at my request. I resented taking a day off work to “move” and knew her motherly instinct would feel compelled to fill in the missing pieces in my kitchen, furniture and maybe even my wardrobe!

So here we are, mixed drinks in hand, we started with the kitchen. The three weeks of newspapers I had been saving were sure to come in handy. Sort of. My mom, who has spent years cleaning black stains off her kitchen table, would rather run her fingernails on a chalkboard than pack with newsprint. Thus only I would be wrapping dishes. Meanwhile, she packed the pots, pans and other miscellaneous items, all the while asking questions I knew there was no answer to.

“Where’s the potato peeler I put in your stocking?”

“Uh. It’s not in one of these 18 drawers? It’s probably upstairs. I never unpacked it.”

Yeah right — the peeler is gone. Living with four roommates, personal belongings are at the mercy of the living situation itself.

So we head upstairs to pack the bedroom where there is a method to my madness. Yet like mothers do, she turned my method onto its head. As I have — five moves before — packed every single piece of clothing in suitcases, boxes and duffle bags. Moved. And unpacked. This didn’t make sense to my mom.

“Why not just hang them on a bar in the car and we can walk them right up to the closet?” Granted this would be easier, but it wasn’t my method. Stubborn (I don’t know why), I try to re-explain the boxes. We poked and prodded the issue, made more drinks, exchanged a few heated words and began carry clothes to the bar now hanging in my car.

At this point we are packing the car for load one of (probably) 26. Slightly annoyed with each other, as this is just the nature of the moving beast, we are shuffling up and down the stairs; I of course bring the heavy items. She of course, tells me where to put the heavy items. Humidity at this point is still 100 percent at 8 p.m., and the sun is setting just enough that we both trip over the uncharted landscape in the front yard.

“Do you want to take your jeans?” she yells off the front porch while I put the jigsaw together in the back of my car.

“NO! The denim stays. I have a lot invested in those, they go last.”

“WELL THERE’S A LOT INVESTED IN THAT DIPLOMA FRAME! MAYBE YOU SHOULD LEAVE IT TILL LAST.”

Ramshackle, we crawl into the front seats trying to catch our breath. It’s a quite ride to the new house.

The throes of moving a twentysomething in the middle of summer are, and always will be, nothing to look forward to. You acquire more than you ever think and swear you will hire someone next year and worst of all, one becomes consumed with high levels anxiety for no reason. More power to my mom for flying out to help me move. I am not surprised however that she’s made no mention of returning next year.