Relocation Countdown

Very nearly three months to go.

It's amazing the number of things that need to be done when you're relocating to another country. My days recently have been filled with disposing of various items, either through finding a good home for them, selling them, or taking them to the dump. Unfortunately, eBay isn't the great site it once was as I've discovered recently. You have to pay them to even list things on the site nowadays, and if you wait for no-listing fee days, you're less likely to sell anything - too many competitors.

Trying to sell No. 2 son's guitars has proven fruitless. Two of the three didn't sell, despite having lots of watchers and the one that did sell was a false sale. The buyer emailed to say his daughter had bid without his permission and he couldn't travel to us to pick it up; would I accept half the price? I replied that it was okay, just to pay the selling fee and I'd forget about it. No sign of any fee yet. I think I'll try putting them on Gumtree, which seems to be free.

Other parts of my family's history are slowly being disposed of too. Books and dvds are selling from Amazon; a boy's ballet outfit (needless to say, in very good, hardly worn condition); a Chinese fancy dress outfit. It is sad but they have to go. How many things can you store for the rest of your life, just so that many years from now you can pull them out and reminisce?

This process of clearing out really brings home to you the relative importance of each thing that has been kept. Some things that I won't be getting rid of: photographs that record all of the people and places that are or have been important to me; items from my sons' baby years, such as locks of their hair, their first shoes, first scrawled drawing; a handful of books from my childhood; precious presents from family and friends; a few letters, some of which were written by people who are no longer alive.

It's strange how this decision to move away to a different life opens up so many unexpected things to the light.