Tomorrow, we will have lived in our new place two weeks. I think I’m making progress getting adjusted because it only took me two attempts instead of three to find which drawer the silverware is in.

I’m still having flashbacks about moving, particularly the amount of dust, lint, and cat hair that was living behind our dresser in the bedroom. It was scary. There was at least two inches of gray stuff billowing behind the furniture. Had I known it was there, I don’t think I could have slept without envisioning it growing into a giant blob and attacking me during the night.

Having it exposed made me wonder if I am an especially derelict housekeeper. Do most women move the furniture away from the walls and vacuum the baseboards every year?

So in the future, I plan to move every 17 years whether I need to or not.

It feels so good to know that everything we have moved is actually stuff that we will use. Cleaning out the cupboards was like an archeological dig. I threw out a jar of coriander that had an expiration date of 1992, a bag of quinoa that I had bought at Whole Foods at least 10 years ago when quinoa was the hot new food item, and a tin with a quarter inch of ground pepper that was so old it had lost all its flavor.

By the time I cleaned out the house and Steve cleaned out the garage, we probably had enough to fill a small dumpster and had we thought ahead, we probably would have rented one. Since we were on a tight timetable to be out of the house, our best option was calling 800-Got-Junk. The uniformed guys showed up that day and although they weren’t cheap, they were incredibly efficient and they even swept the garage floor after loading all the junk on their truck.

If we decide to move again, it will be a much easier move. We’ve slimmed down our possessions so that everything we own will fit in 1000 square feet less of living space than we had before. I am amazed because we actually have empty drawers.

Now it feels like we could pack up our household in a weekend. And because we’re renting, we have thethe freedom to change our living situation at any time. I don’t see us becoming gypsies but being locked into a 30 year mortgage is a thing of the past for us.