There is something so poignant about the aftermath of a move — the empty apartment that used to be your home is now an echo-filled void. For the person looking to move in the space is full of potential but for the outgoing resident, it is the end of a chapter, a slice of life that can never again be recreated. The apartment above is, or rather was, mine, and I am certainly sad to say goodbye to my home of the last four years.
I took a bunch of pictures of this apartment in better days, pictures that show off my favorite elements of the home and capture the feeling of the life I led here. With a job that requires moving internationally every few years, I've found that is it nice to have visual reminders of my various homes to look back on once I've moved on to new vistas. Knowing that I can always look back in the space in the future helps me let go in the present.
I've also found that knowing what I'm moving into helps me in the process- the sadness of leaving one home is offset by the excitement of planning for the new one. This time around, I got only limited information about my new space so I'm moving in the blind which certainly made packing for shipment vs. storage rather challenging. Still though, there is a certain thrill to the idea of moving into a place sight unseen and making it my own.
In the end, I confess that I am a creature of habit and so moving is always a traumatic experience for me. I always wait until the last minute to start organizing, I always have stuff left over that I'm frantically dealing with on the last day, and I'm always much sadder about leaving than I am excited about my new adventure. Once I arrive at my new destination I rediscover the joy, but on a day like today when I'm getting ready to turn in my keys, I always find myself fixated on that Barenaked Ladies song "The Old Apartment", saddened that what this morning was my home will tomorrow be nothing more than that place I used to live.
What about you? Do you focus on moving as the start of something wonderful or as the end of something great? Apart from the stress of the move itself, do you find yourself giddy with anticiaption or mired in sadness when the time comes to lock the door for the last time?
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People are usually so focused on getting out and getting the unit clean that they don't dwell on the memories.
Most of us have been everywhere from, "I am SO glad to be out of there" to "I hate to leave".
I hear you. We're about to vacate our current house where we got married, discovered we're expecting a baby boy, and which he called home for 4.5 years. But I'm not sad at all, and really looking forward to move to our next house (only a mile away) and start to decorate from a scratch! I found that 5-6 years in a rental is about as much as I can bare. I'm sure it'll be different when we have our own house.
When I moved out of my very first apartment of three and a half years, I felt like I was hearing some slow, sappy, ruminating music playing in my head. I felt like Mr. Feeny saying, "Class dismissed," for the very last time. Not that I taught classes in my apartment or anything...
Now, when I walk by and see that the new tenant has a weird lamp and bad curtains hanging in the window, I can't help but cringe and wonder what 2MM looks like now...
We just sold our house of 20 years. Now in a rental for 1 year (our house sold very quickly) and then onto a beautiful rural place! It was the home where we raised our son and we had very happy memories. I was sad to leave. My husband reminded me that all the important "things" came with us...our family.
Wow, this post really hits home considering we just moved into a new place about a week ago. Luckily we didn't move to an area too far away so we had some overlap between the two leases, which gave us much needed time to bring stuff over to the new place. Up until the move I was mostly just excited about being in the new plac, and couldn't wait to get all of the work behind us. But strangely, on the last night we were at the old place the rush of memories overwhelmed me and I became more sad about leaving than I realized I would. Overall though, I think the opportunity to re-assess what we own and how we use it and re-decorate outweighs the sadness.
My husband and I have so far had the good fortune of always having "moved up": from a rented floor-through to a rented railroad apt, to a rented two BR, and recently to our first house, so there was always something to look forward to, despite the stress and anxiety of moving. Even still, there has never NOT been an element of sadness and anticipatory nostalgia for leaving places with so many good memories. I still have fond memories of our first place, where we had to eat right on our kitchen floor (no dining set, so we ate on a low game table and cushions).
Yes, and yes. When we moved a couple months ago, I grieved big time. And I also felt really excited for the new adventure. Some days, I still feel intensely sad (we moved out of state, so we said goodbye to our beloved friends as well as our home of 7 years). But I do absolutely love the blank slate of a new home--decorating, exploring new restaurants, etc.
lemondrop, I teared up when I read the "Classed dismissed" comment. I have just realized the true depths of my dorkiness.
Sadness is a big part of why I'm dragging my feet on getting my parent's house sold. They've both passed away and I feel a stronger connection to this house than my two siblings. I'm living here and trying to prep it for sale, because they want their inheritance and not put money into fixing it up. It needs a lot.
The tremendous excitement I feel about my new housing plans is wonderful but it doesn't seem to have overshadowed my sadness and the impending sense of loss I feel over moving out of here, the house we called home since 1963.
I feel your pain, Colleen.
I definitely understand the sadness. Up until the last place I lived I never really cared much about moving out of my apartments. I was out of college and would live in an apartment with a roommate for a year or two and then move on to something else. Nothing terribly sentimental there. Then I moved in with my boyfriend and we lived in our apartment for 4 years. He proposed to me in that apartment. It was our first home as husband and wife. Then we bought a house this year and had to say good bye to our city life and our apartment. Though I'm happy where we are and excited to renovate and decorate, that apartment was our very first home and it makes me sad to think of it even now, months after we've moved. I wonder if the new tenants are being good to her. I hope they are.
The article (and comments) are so true. It's bittersweet moving on, like leaving an old friend. Suddenly all the things you hated about the place become quirky characteristics instead of annoying irritants.
@avalolth, we're kindred.
There is nothing I hate more than sentimentality.
--Max Beckmann
Our family moved fairly frequently as my Father was Active-Duty Military.
There was always a sense of anticipation and relief after the moving truck had finally left with all our furniture, the cars were packed and we had "Sign-Off" from Base Housing that there was no more cleaning to do in the old place. So as we backed down the driveway of an old house for the last time, Mom would say "The end of one chapter is the beginning of the next"...
...then she'd turn up the radio, shift the big Mercury into "Drive" and we'd begin the next cross-continent adventure towards our new home.
We are in the process of selling our home. Last week someone drove by our house and wanted to take a look inside. I didn't answer the door but instead cried on the other side of the door. Since then I've learned how to cope and am excited about our next home.
Moving into a place where you know what it looks like is helpful. I just moved internationally and though I dislike my prev apartment initially, I loved it at the end because of the effort I put in to make it looked nice. Everyone that came to my place loved it. It was quite sad when we have to "dismantle" the place.
Saying that, I am quite excited about starting at a new place and redecorate with different things. It's the in between when you have not achieve a finish look with the new place because of budget or things you cannot change in the apartment that's frustrating.
We are creature of habits. Loosing that familiarity is always daunting at first. At times like this, I will find myself going back to all my fave blogs and mags to look for inspiration to RE-NEST. :)
We are in the process of leaving our home of 30 years for a tiny studio in SF. We don't want to sell the house as it is paid for and we would eventually retire here but we cannot just leave it sit empty either. It's hard because we have had so much fun, so many good times, in this home where our daughter grew up. We love the tiny apartment in the big city, but...
I'm hopelessly sentimental about the places I've lived. I'm in the process of moving right now, and spent the weekend packing... I realized after packing up half my living room area that I forgot to take pictures. I nearly cried. My boyfriend put back a bunch of stuff so we could take pictures but it still wasn't the same! I'll be very sad to leave.
Most of our moves as adults have been cross-country to new jobs and new lives. In each case, anticipation outweighed any melancholy, and I think it helped that we moved so far away (never less than 1500 miles) so we weren't confronted with the previous home on a regular basis. Especially as I began to build gardens and then had to leave them, I have been happier to move far away, so I can't see what people have done since. Now we think we are in our "for a long time" home, and I can tell that when the time comes for us to leave here, it will be bittersweet.
@veslabeachgirl: i hope the process will be a healing and rewarding one for you. hope your future is filled with wonderful things
We moved all the time when I was a kid (phone company, not military). We finally stayed put in 1983 and even though I left for college in 1991, that was "home" until my parents retired in 1998.
Two years ago I bought my first house and vacated an apartment I'd lived in for five years. It was just an apartment, nice but not special, but besides the family home I have never lived anywhere longer. I took a picture very similar to yours above and get a tiny twinge when I think of it.
But I do love my house.
What a wonderful post.
Thank you.
I have moved many times as well, but I think our next move - in less than a week - will be a bit emotional for me. I hate this apartment we've rented ever since our son was born (we lived here three years before that). We knew it wouldn't be suitable for him but it's taken us nearly two years since his birth to find something we could buy. Despite the fact that the new place will be so much better, this is the only home my son has ever known, so it all must be very scary for him, and I'm seeing it through his eyes. He'll be exactly 21 months old on moving day. It will definitely be a bittersweet moment to hand back the keys!
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What a great post! I am glad I ran into it. I have to say that I'm beginning to feel a great depression and anxiety towards moving out of my first apartment. There are so many good and bad memories that are attached to that place that it's truly making it difficult for me to not get sentimental about letting go. After 8 years, it's really the place where I became an adult. Now, my girlfriend and I are moving in together to a much newer, two-story condo and while I'm excited about the new upgrades along with being with my girlfriend. I can't help begin to miss my old, cheaper, walls that I painted, plants that I tried to keep alive, what should of been a short-term rental with hardly any insulation (cold winters) but cozy "to me" apartment. It's just like someone who commented said earlier: All the the things I hated about my place are now the interesting, quirky, characteristics of it that I've come to admire and make my home. My girlfriend thinks that what's really bothering me is that the bachelor pad will be no more...Maybe she's right? I do know that my last night there will be full of emotion and when morning comes it'll hit me. I just gotta keep telling myself that, that moment in time was going to come sooner or later and that it's time to turn that page and just let the next chapter of my life begin. :(
Mario