The last time I packed my life into boxes was four years ago. Some of the boxes were already packed from a year earlier. At that time, I’d moved to four countries in four years and I was well-practiced. But in the intervening years, I have not only acquired things that I would actually like to keep, but four years in a place is just a different sort of packing up.

If it can’t fit in a box, which then fits into 4.5 cubic metres, and if it can’t fit into one of two 23kg-limited suitcases, it can’t go. There is no space for last-minute decisions.

Buying real furniture was a big deal. It meant that I could no longer pack a suitcase and leave. I have three pieces of furniture that will take up most of the space. The kitchen chairs are last on the list. We’ll see, the movers told me.

But even if I’d packed up and left before the furniture, it would have meant leaving the books and I’ve already done that twice. So all fifty books will be packed. And how is it only fifty? The others, countless others, are in different boxes on a different continent. They will stay where they are.

Most of my kitchenware will be packed. I’ll need to buy a few new things on arrival, things like pots and pans and chopping boards. No sense waiting untold months for those to arrive. But I can live without the dishes (containers are on the upon-arrival-shopping-list), so all of the dishes will be packed, three pieces of service for four. I wonder how many will break on the way? All of the cutlery, too, because it’s a set for eight and a good one. The glassware will be packed. And some of it will probably break.

The art will be packed, as will what I termed “decorative items” (close enough to tchatzkes, right?) on the insurance list. We need clarification, they wrote back. I clarified.

The climbing gear is packed, as are journals and letters, mail received and beloved. Board games neatly stacked – do they sell board games in English over there? The bag of bags was packed with another bag, along with dance shoes, crochet materials (I’ve brought the nice yarn all this way, after all), stationery (I’ve had that orange stapler since someone made me a pre-university care package), a spare sewing kit, and all of the things we forget we once needed until we’re ruthlessly discarding them. But the two pieces of leftover tissue paper came in handy while wrapping the aforementioned tchatzkes. Decorative items.

The contents of my night table drawers will go into my carry-on bag. Things that they tell you not to pack in a suitcase. Laptop and related tech, legal documents, jewelry, cash, camera. Current journal with two pens because of that one time. Etc.

A sheet and a towel need to go into the suitcase, along with a small knife, my most favourite cooking utensils, and a set of bamboo cutlery. There are several weeks to go, after all. And then I’m moving immediately into an empty apartment, and my shipment won’t arrive until it arrives, and it can’t land at Customs until some bureaucracy is attended to. A couple of weeks of work outfits and their shoes need to go into the suitcase because school will likely start before my stuff arrives, and first impressions are everything.

It is making decisions about the clothes (and gosh, what if the weather turns?) that I am postponing as I write this. There’s nothing remaining on the walls, there are neat piles on the floor, but there is still normalcy in the closet. I know where everything is and it looks like it’s supposed to look in there. Once the hangers are piled up and boxed for shipping, everything left just sits in a suitcase.

And then the apartment is empty of most of what it means to physically live somewhere.

But I’m having guests for dinner this weekend so the kitchen, at least, will wait another day.