Dismantling our home

Even though I knew it was going to  happen, somehow it was really upsetting to see Soeun taking apart our bed yesterday. Watching the legs come off the base of the metal frame as my husband unscrewed it, made me feel like our place of comfort was being dismembered. This week Velvet Ashes theme is chaos, very fitting for our week too.

This house move is different to many of our other moves.
I'm not pregnant this time, as I was the last two moves. We aren't needing to cull our belongings to fit in a 20kg bag as we do when we move internationally.  And we're also not trying to get rid of things so everything will fit on one truck, like we did when we moved from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. And we don't even have a moving day, more like a moving week.

But its also the same as every other move.
Seeing all our belonging packed up, and moved around and out the door feels so disorientating, like we are dismantling our home. Packing and moving all the things in our home means the space where I feel comfortable and in control is disappearing. Living cross-culturally, so many things feel so chaotic. When I'm out and about in the crazy traffic and markets it can be exciting and stressful at the same time. Knowing I've got a calm, comfortable space to come home to means I can enjoy the chaos and be part of it more. And although we have somewhere else to go when we move out of here, it will be awhile before we are unpacked and settled. We'll be living out of routine and out of boxes. Suspended in limbo for an unknown amount of time.

A new place is hard to imagine, I'm not sure what to expect. New habits, new sounds, new routes to new shops. New ways to make sharing space and time work for me (an introvert from an individualist culture) and for all the other family members. And then even when we do settle in that place, it is still temporary.

Seeing  my bed turn into a pile of pipes mostly feels like falling off a cliff but hopefully this is a reminder that we do have an eternal home.