Piece By Piece

Trey Smith

When I try to explain to people that I like a certain order, a lot of these folks get a completely wrong idea. They think I must be some sort of neat freak! You know, the kind of person who blows a gasket if one stick of furniture is accidentally moved askance or goes ballistic if a wisp of dust is allowed to settle anywhere in sight.

That does not describe me in the least. I am a very cluttered person -- someone famous for making piles of who knows what. But though I am cluttered, I still crave order.

When we moved into this house in August 2007, I arranged the furniture in my computer room and bedroom just so. In all this time, NOTHING has moved. Unlike my wife, who has periodically rearranged her bedroom, once I decide where something goes, it stays put.

Now, unfortunately, I am at the stage of moving whereby I am compelled to move these items from their assigned spots. I have moved out the two bookcases from my computer room plus a shelf and chair from my bedroom. Each time I remove a piece of furniture from its "permanent" placement, it aggrieves me terribly. The room no longer looks "normal". As I sit here pecking out this post, I feel as if I am doing so in someone else's house!

And it's only going to get worse. By Sunday evening, I will completely dismantle these two rooms and move the combined furniture as well as my computer to the front bedroom downstairs. Sunday night will be weirder than weird as I [try to] sleep in a totally different room. The next morning I will load up the remaining furniture in the rental truck and head to Ocean Shores.

On Monday night, not only will my bed and computer be in yet another room, but they will be in a totally different structure in a different town. My sincere hope is that I will be so exhausted from the day's events that I will collapse in my new bedroom before the feelings of complete disorientation set in. My first few days up north will be fraught with overwhelming anxiety as I come to grips with my new normal. Yet, I know that, in short amount of time, I will forget the feel of my set-up here in South Bend and the new normal will no longer feel new.

The hard part is getting from where I am right now to there.