I am certain that military families can relate to my tale of love and loss. No, this isn’t about the tragic death of my soldier husband. I’m talking about my furniture.
When I got married in 2008 we were all set to settle in Atlanta, GA. My husband was enjoying his job and I was ready to experience city life with him. We gathered up the gift cards and cash from our generous friends and family, paid off our credit cards, and stuffed my car full of things to transport from our Florida hometown to Atlanta. Then we went shopping.
Most of our haul came from Target and IKEA – not a design masterpiece in the lot, but cute and functional furniture nonetheless. I typically insisted on things that wasn’t made out of particleboard. We got a lovely bedframe made of solid wood and 2 particle board nightstands. We got a fantastic beech kitchen table with drawers in it. I LOVE that table. We got matching chairs and a TV stand and floor lamps and lots and lots of accessories.
But all good things come to an end, and we left our adorable vintage home when the lease was up. We came back to Florida with a trailer full of furnishings and stuck in a storage unit.
Yes, a storage unit. Those treasure troves and junkyards that people pay hundreds of dollars a year hide their baggage in. They hide it because they don’t want to deal with it – and we certainly didn’t. We had other things to deal with, like finding jobs and making plans for our future. We got jobs. Then we decided to move to California. Then we put it off a little longer. But eventually the baggage begins to decay your soul.
I have just gotten to the point where I simply can’t handle another move without a massive purge. I have come to terms with the fact that it is simply foolish to even think about moving such cheap furniture cross country. I will sell my furniture on Craigslist. I will donate my shoes and clothes and beloved books and video games to a thrift store. I will reduce my life to the size of my car once again.
But what then is left of beauty, design, the meaning that familiar shapes and collections of objects bring to our daily lives? I read Apartment Therapy and Design*Sponge and promise myself that someday I’ll have a place I can really decorate – a place I won’t impulsively move away from.
Yet part of me knows, deep down, that I want to live the minimalist life. Buying even the smallest items (socks, shampoo, 50% off Christmas ornaments) has become one heck of a conundrum. Will it fit in my car? Is it worth hauling 3000 miles? Will it match any apartment?
To make myself feel better, I imagine that California is full of dream apartments and wonderful antique stores. I imagine my future living space – peaceful, with nary a dirty dish in sight, with my non-tacky unicorn collection bringing magic to the bookshelves.
But I don’t have a unicorn collection, much less a non-tacky one. I don’t have any collections. I don’t want an excuse to accumulate clutter. I want Scandinavian white walls and floors. But living in a rental is prohibitive to even that wish. And who knows how many more rentals lie in my immediate, not to mention my distant, future?
How can you bring beauty and good design and zen happiness into your life when you live out of a suitcase and a backpack, your next move always looming over your current situation? Make the best of it, you might say. But when your current lot is uncertaintly, you cannot buy an organic soy candle without thinking you will either have to throw out your $20 purchase next month or burn it by then or move it.
The truly zen answer is to detach from my posessions and be ready to give them away. I am working towards this. In the meantime, who wants to buy an IKEA beech table with drawers?
