A DAD'S LIFE: Actually, it's not as bad as having your arm chewed off
MOVING HOUSE? Go on, say it to anyone. Turn around to the person beside you and inform them you’re moving house. They will tell you it’s as stressful as bereavement or divorce. Apparently, it’s in the Constitution that this piece of social dogma be passed along at every opportunity. Whoever made up that stat has a lot to answer for.
Our impending transfer had been on the cards for a long time, so I had the pleasure of being told hundreds of times that my stress was about to hit the roof. Random passersby would tap me on the shoulder. “Are you the fella moving house? It’s worse that having your arm chewed off in a meatgrinder,” they’d say.
I resolved that this would be the calmest move in history: we would be the first family carried from old home to new home in a bubble of serenity. But to achieve this level of familial peace I knew the rest of the pack would have to be similarly chilled.
It’s never a good idea to suggest to the missus that she calm down. In fact, the utterance of any phrase resembling “chill out” is known medically to precede the insertion of cooking utensils in skulls among married couples. It seemed more advisable to be so well organised that her existence would barely be affected by the process.
With the kids, I figured that basic preparation and an explanation of what we were doing, why we were doing it, when and where all events would transpire, should be enough to avoid upset. They’re big on detail and feeling involved. They would drive the removals truck if need be.
For my own sanity, I concentrated on the physicality of the event. All moving house involves is the transport of a collection of goods from one location to another. How could that compare to the death of a loved one?
Armed with a sense of positivity and determination, we approached the task. I asked the younger child, “Are you looking forward to the new place? Will you miss this one?” She scoffed at the notion that she might be upset in any way by such a minor inconvenience. I thought to myself, there’s a tough little broad: no skin off her nose – then wondered what was going on as she crept into bed with us for the fourth night in a row the week before departure date.
Next stop, the elder daughter. She too professed she wasn’t fazed by anything. She had a few particulars she’d miss but figured that having her own room for the first time would make up for anything she might lose. Cool as a cucumber, she claimed.
The Saturday before moving day I dropped her to her cousins’ house for a sleepover. She cried all the way, claiming she was afraid she’d miss me during the night. Would I ring before bedtime? Could she call me anytime if she wanted to? No undercurrents of worry there, then.
The missus swanned along. No problem this moving thing. Any time I attempted to ask her a question pertaining to practical change-of-address issues she had an e-mail to write, a work call to make. In a stroke of serendipity, her job took her away for three nights during the build-up. Some may have said this was a nice piece of advance planning but who am I to suggest such a thing? Just because she works for herself doesn’t mean she has control of her schedule.
And me, the model of calm and fortitude. First the back gave out, immediately followed by the knee. Energy dropped and headaches plagued me. Migraines, not just your regular dinker. I presumed it must be ME, possibly even MS.
When pain started to work its way through my torso it became obvious the Big C had me in its grasp. Riddled, I knew. I would have worried out the possibilities with my wife, but she was busy making work calls in a hotel room 150 miles away.
I pictured myself rotting from the inside out, felt my body turn to husk. This was no psychosomatic response, this was real.
So, to the act of transporting a collection of goods from one location to another. In itself, it’s not a problem. Some goods may break, some will be lost en route, some will turn up and you’ll wonder why you had them in the first place. That bit’s easy.
Coping with the anticipation is the problem. The next time someone tells you moving house is up there with 30 years in a gulag, poke them in the eye with a stick.