High road, low road — whichever, we’ll shortly be on our way to the Highlands.
I’m sitting in Craig’s now-empty flat, as the movers have left with all our belongings in a giant lorry which will, somehow, traverse all the little windy roads up to Wick by the end of the day.
As has been my experience of everyone from there so far, the movers were really friendly and chatty, and didn’t even blink at the prospect of Craig and me being a couple. There may be a Conservative dork in the news who’s using a divisive “gays aren’t normal” platform to try to garner election support, but I feel from what I’ve witnessed so far that people’s misgivings about us as a same-sex couple moving up north are groundless in reality. As I tweeted yesterday, politics and the news sketch the world in terms of duality and conflict, but real life is better than that. People have a greater capacity for understanding than we often give them credit for. I suppose the truth will probably be somewhere in the middle, but hopefully leaning toward the types of good people we’ve met so far.
My brother pointed out that a move is a great time to do an audit of the stuff we’ve collected, and this move has been no different. Yet this time I haven’t encountered all kinds of “Oh, why did I buy that?” items; instead, I had a few things I gave to people — for money or not — who could make use of them, and the rest was mostly material I could take down the street to the giant recycling wheelie-bins. Most of these things had already been through a first life, too — I was just holding onto them because I thought I might someday turn them into something else. I still packed a boatload of various sheets and rolls and scraps of paper, but for the rest I asked myself, “Really? Are you really going to use that?”, and binned whatever got a no.
It’s been a huge job, getting ready to go, culminating in cleaning up the empty old flat with my once-flatmate, back-to-being-my-buddy Patrick and his partner Joe, who’s a really kind and light-hearted spirit wrapped in the body of an Australian surf-god (with a Scots accent).
Unlike the last flat, which became a battle at the end with the letting agency over what constitutes “clean” when you’ve inherited decades of other peoples’ gunk, this flat polished up satisfyingly, so hopefully we’ll get all of our deposit back. We finished up with Chinese food at Patrick’s temporary digs, then I rode the train back to Dunfermline, with a bag of cleaning goods — squeegee sticking out the top — and a bin-bag stuffed full of couch-cushions I’d accidentally left when I moved my stuff.
Apparently I tossed and snored all night, but the house here was in a state, with Craig trying at the last minute to get things ready for the movers. (He’s been very busy at the hospital, finishing up his duties to his patients and paperwork.) But, generally, everything about the move has been a success. Moving was a huge task, and one I’ve hated doing in the past, but it all worked out through our taking it one step at a time. Every time I felt overwhelmed by how much there was to do, I just made a list or asked myself, “What’s the next small task?” and did that. And now, in terms of the leaving part, I’m done.
What’s left is the arriving.
Doing my weekly planning session this week, I realised I was starting to feel hesitant about the approaching reality of living in Wick. Of course, with all such things, I just had to tap at the feeling and it opened up. What is this really about?, I asked myself. And what it was about was that I had no picture of what I would actually do up there. Being there was one thing, but what it took to make myself feel more comfortable was brainstorming some of the things I wanted to work on once this moving business was over. I’ve got an idea for a book (different from the other two that have been rolling around in my head, this one more approachable), and there’s bookbinding work I’d like to do… plus a bunch of other stuff.
Of course, none of what I came up with would surprise anyone who’s been paying attention, but I needed to state this stuff.
And now I’m excited.
Okay, and a bit nervous, but at least now I’m also excited.
