I’m moving today…. again. Like most people, I hate moving. As a matter of fact, on my list of “miserable human experiences,” the ranking goes something like this:
1. Moving
2. Grading
3. Dying (a distant third, really)
I’ve got good help (read: “students”) and I’m going to do my best to be chipper today, but I got to thinking about it last night and realized that I have moved more than the average bear in my life. The longest I’ve ever lived in one single abode, which was the house that my folks lived in while I was in high school, is 4 years. (That’s only a hair over 11% of my entire life. You do the math.) That also means that I lived in my State College apartment (in grad school) only one year short of my personal single-address-longevity record. Since grad school is, by definition, a temporary phase in one’s life, I don’t take it as a good sign that it represents one of the most stable residences in my life. So, my plan now is to stay in this new apartment until I get tenure or die, whichever comes first.
I don’t even dare try to figure the odds of which one will, in fact, come first.
Knowing the amazing you, I have little doubt that you will get tenure before you die.
I’ve been thinking about moving too. I’ve moved three times in Philadelphia in the last eight years and with basically the same movers (my brothers) who at this point have just begun refusing to move certain pieces (the last time I moved they said the Singer sewing machine was just going on the curb next time — so if anyone is looking for a Singer sewing machine, I am moving at the end of July and will part with it if you move it).
But moving is always sad. It’s even sad when it is from one house to another in the same city or even neighborhood. The sad thing about the fact that we move so often is that we become separated from the places of our lives. I recently heard bell hooks say that it’s difficult for us to have a spiritual center when we don’t have a geographical one. I’ve been trying to think about what it means to have a geographical center that I will no longer live in.
I hate moving because it makes me wonder if I should have all these books.