The winds of change are blowing again

In my case, the winds of change are blowing dishes and cooking appliances around the kitchen, scattering boxes throughout the living room, and keeping the washing machine going into late hours of the night.

It's moving time.

Despite the obvious hassles that accompany every move, the process is oddly exciting. It's rejuvenating to purge your current place of residence of all evidence of your existence and to dump all your baggage someplace else. Your new home doesn't know that you throw your shoes in the closet rather than line them up neatly; it doesn't know that you hit the snooze button at least three times every morning; and it doesn't know how often you heat up fajitas for dinner because you don't want to cook a real meal. Your new home will give you a chance to start anew, to fix the little things in your life you've been meaning to improve upon.

The move I will be making in a few weeks spans spans so short a distance it almost seems pointless to move at all. In fact, I won't even need any big vehicles to transport anything; an assembly line of enthusiastic family members will suffice.

The change, however, will still be significant. More significant, perhaps, than any of my other moves. Rather than replace my roommate (who is getting married on Saturday), I am moving all of my stuff three buildings over to a smaller (and cheaper) apartment.

I have been evaluating the major milestones I've crossed on my journey to big-girl-hood, and I figure this makes number six, after high school graduation, the entire college experience, college graduation, going through the temple, and starting a career. For me, milestone six will be moving into my own bachelorette pad. It will involve unlearning much of what I learned in kindergarten because I will no longer have to share.

In preparing to move from my past apartments, I always felt that twinge that comes with every major change: excitement at the new road ahead, sadness at the one you're leaving behind, and fear of the unknown. I usually celebrated this occasion by staying up all night doing nothing productive, such as lighting peeps on fire, eating lots of junk food, watching Gilmore Girls, sucking helium balloons, and watching the sun rise.

I've finally come to my senses and ended my no-sleep-the-night-before-the-move tradition; I have no desire to lug heavy items from one apartment to another, in the cold and rain, having been awake for 30 hours straight. It gives me a headache just thinking about it. No, this time, I've got big plans to move the TV into my roommate's vacated room and have a movie night in the spare 'oom while eating, pizza, possibly? and then going to bed at the reasonable hour of midnight.

As for that usual twinge, I felt it a little bit this week. I am ending the roommate era, one that is full of horror stories and wonderful memories. However, I can't tell you how much of a relief it is to know that my next roommate will be my husband, not some random girl I have to learn to coexist with until she gets married, graduates, or goes on a mission. That part of my life is over.

From here, its onward to independence.