there goes my life...into big brown boxes.

On July 22, 2009 I wrote this post , when the four brown UPS boxes containing my life arrived in Miami, Florida to be shipped to Colombia. I posted this picture of the boxes in my living room in Eagan, Minnesota before I shipped them. Almost five months later I sat in my Colombian living room packing my life into the same brown boxes.

Today is the official moving day. I left my apartment at 6:15 am this morning with everything packed and ready for the movers from school. They will move everything during the day, while I am at school, and then this afternoon I will go to my new apartment in the neighborhood San Fernando.

This makes the fifth time I have moved in five years, and the fifth time in five moves where I have been the last one to leave the apartment. Perhaps this results in my inability to say goodbye to a place I called "home". Moving always makes me feel sentimental. I remember driving away from my apartment after senior year of college, just seven months ago, while my roommate of three and a half years drove off in the other direction. If you really think about it, what a strange ending to such an important time in our lives. After being each other's family day in and day out we suddenly packed everything up, cleaned the floors, and then said "See ya later". I remember thinking things will never be the same as when we lived together.

Living together changes a person - you learn from one another. You learn new recipes, new music, new hobbies, new passions. Maggie and I learned a lot from each other, and I am so grateful for her presence during our first days, weeks, and months in Colombia. Having someone there to experience the ups and downs of finding an apartment, moving in, and getting adjusted was invaluable.

Today will start a new series of learning, as I explore my new apartment, new neighborhood and new part of Cali. While change and transition is good for the soul, in the end, I love the feeling of being settled in a place...and brown generic boxes from UPS do not leave one feeling very settled.