At Least I'm Not As Crazy As Basil Marceaux. Though That Leaves A Whole Lot Of Room For Crazy.

I'm tending towards silence here these days not only because my days are filled with packing or children or both, but also because my thoughts have been tumbling about from one point to another and don't seem to settle down into one coherent post. Well, except for when I'm driving, per usual, and then long and lovely and loquacious posts spin themselves out in my mind, only to be lost by the time I park.

(I do remember the tag line I'd composed for a potential post about Basil Marceaux, quite possibly the craziest political candidate I've ever seen. Well, at least the most obviously crazy. I had planned to write a snarky post starting with his shockingly bad TV spot, then his horrendous website, with an additional focus on page 4 where he includes his letters to the United Nation [sic] and the FBI, at which point my friend Heidi and MTL and I started debating whether he was schizophrenic or had suffered from closed head trauma. I was going to end the post with Oh Tennessee. Bless yer heart. Yer crazy is showin'.)

Here's the thing about change: it's stressful. Even when it's good change, and change that I love, and involves people I love, and I know that I will be and am very happy about it all. Nevertheless, it's change, and it's stress. I feel rather as though over the last two years my entire life has been turned inside out, shaken, scrubbed thoroughly, taken apart at the seams, and resewn into a new configuration. Which, really, is rather a good thing, but is nevertheless rather exhausting. So I find myself attempting to scrape up the energy to finish packing in these last two days before we move on Saturday. The attempt is rather weak.

I've done more cleaning, purging, tossing, donating, and packing of Stuff over the last month and a half than I think I've ever done, largely because I did it The Right Way. This means that rather than just tossing anything and everything in boxes with the vague idea of Sorting It Out Later, I've been going through things very thoroughly. Perhaps too thoroughly at times: I threw out some items that I probably should not have thrown out and had to deal with a very unhappy Ex at one point. I've made seven or eight (I've lost track) visits to donation centers with a car packed to the brim with giveaway items. I've tossed dozens of giant garbage bags of trash onto the curb. I've stripped away the useless and the broken and the unwanted and the forgotten.

And still there is so much left to move this weekend. I won't tell you how many bins of shoes are involved. Or boxes of books. We all know about my addictions.

I'll admit to some anxiety about my new paradigm. To jump from two small boys to five children ranging from three to fourteen is a bit of a shock to one's system. I mean, just imagine. I have to learn how to braid hair!!!

It's a good thing we all, in general, get along. There are bumps, of course, but it could be so very much worse. And MTL is so very worth it.

Nevertheless...it's all quite stressful. So last night I slept restlessly as I suffered the consequences of not doing my physical therapy exercises yesterday and as anxiety dreams flitted through my head. From what I recall, they mainly dealt with trying to move and discovering that everything had unpacked itself, or the trucks got lost somewhere in the handful of miles between one place and the next, or the children kept climbing into boxes trying to pack themselves, or I kept forgetting what I was supposed to take. Oh, and then there were the dreams triggered by work starting up in a month coupled with the need to get children registered and ready for school once we move.

Have I mentioned that I'm a worrier? Yeah.

One day at a time, right? The only problem is that there are only two days left...and still so very much to do.

So I better go work on that mountain of laundry and finish packing the dishes. If you have some extra energy, go ahead and send it my way, would you? Oh, and dark chocolate would be awfully welcome too. Especially with raspberry filling.