Tuesday Travels: The Part I Despise

If you’ve been to this blog before, then you’ve probably already figured out one of my chief interests. Heck, I’ve dedicated a whole day of each week to it.

I’ll give you a hint: It rhymes with “gravel.”

But as much as I love being on the move, there’s one part of my seasonal nomadic shifts that I’ve never quite embraced: the packing. Of course, unpacking runs a close second. I’m a very slow packer – and unpacker, for that matter. Perhaps that’s because I find it hard making decisions, and since Dan and I are usually away from each of our three home bases for several months at a time, I have plenty of decisions to make.

Headed from Michigan to New Orleans, for instance – as we will be tomorrow – I have to consider such things as how many nice dresses to pack. One for the opening night party of our film festival. One for the closing night awards ceremony. One for Thanksgiving. One for Christmas dinner. One for New Year’s Eve. You get the idea.

And then there’s the weather concern. Although it’s usually pretty mild in New Orleans during the fall and winter months, low temperatures are possible, which means shorts and a heavy jacket are equally likely. On top of that, we’ll be traveling to the Florida Keys and Los Angeles before returning to Michigan next May, which opens up a whole slew of other concerns – including the kind of equipment we’ll need for our various ventures – from a digital camera for travel work to supplies for our film fest out west.

Of course, it’s gotten better over the years. We’ve been living this nomadic lifestyle for over three years now, so we’ve learned not to bring everything with us. For example, instead of lugging around our coffeepot, teakettle, dishes, and other kitchen gear, we store what we need in each of our three main ports of call... which has definitely eased our minds a bit. But still, there’s only so much we can purchase in duplicate. Some things – like our laptops – will forever be dragged around in our minivan.

So, I’ve spent all of today packing, and I’m not done yet. Needless to say, it’s going to be a long night, but I’ll get through it. I always do.

P.S. In case you're wondering, the place pictured here is not, in fact, our home in Michigan. It's a cabana where we stayed on South Padre Island, when we first began this nomadic adventure in the spring of 2006 (when the kitty pictured on the beanbag in the first photo was still alive - sniff, sniff). But it gives you an idea of how much junk we carry around...