MOVING OUT
Nate rummaged through the container on his lap with another fifteen boxes stacked up around him like towering pillars of cardboard. An exasperated sigh from across the room let him know that his wife Wren had entered and she was ticked. “I thought I told you to throw all this stuff out!” Wren huffed. “The movers are already here.” “Honey, I threw out everything I could spare.” Nate peered at his wife through a gap in the boxes. “Where?” Wren asked. “In the trash,” Nate said. His wife walked over to the wastebasket, reached in, and pulled out the contents. “A q-tip?” she asked incredulously. “This is what you've thrown out?” “C’mon. We're moving across town, not renouncing our worldly possessions and joining a commune.” “Nate, we talked about this,” she sighed. “We said we were going to make a fresh start and not bring all our baggage with us. “I thought you meant emotional baggage,” he protested. She turned and grabbed the nearest box. “No! Those are my old papers from school. I might need them some day.” “Nate. I can understand if it was your master's thesis or even your first kindergarten watercolor, but you've got a whole box of high school algebra notes in here.” “Do you remember your algebra? I sure don't. I'm going to need those to review. A squared plus B squared...” “And these?” Wren said, tilting another box toward her husband. “Toilet paper tubes. A broken radio. Three remotes to appliances we don't have anymore?” “Spare parts. In case I need to fix something. You always say it's too expensive to have a repairman even look at something. So... I could... you know...” Wren pushed past him to find more of his “precious” belongings on the floor, not even in boxes yet. “What? What is this?” she asked. “Bazooka Joe comics?” “I can trade them in for a canoe.” “Old Christmas cards?” “Reminds me I'm loved.” “Outdated prescription drugs?” “I might relapse.” “Nate, these expired in the nineties! And if you needed medicine, here’s a bizarre idea: we could go out and buy it. We are not moving to the Arctic Circle for God's sake. There's a Rite Aid on the corner.” “You don’t…” Nate started, but Wren interrupted. “Wait. Tell me this is not a box of used Kleenex.” “Hey, that's my bodily fluid in there,” Nate protested. “With my DNA. You want that to fall into the hands of any old garbage man? What if I lose a limb and need to clone a new one...” “This is ridiculous,” Wren said, shaking her head. “Oh yeah?” Nate said. “Well, what about you and your silly little Porcelain cat figurine collection, sitting around gathering dust?” “I have one. One cat. That my mother gave me. On her deathbed.” “Okay, okay, we’ll compromise,” Nate suggested. “Just, let me bring, um, all of this, and then the next time we move...” “We’ll have even more!” she cried, throwing pieces of his pointless collection at him. “Broken cassette tapes. Dried up sea monkeys. Peanut butter jars filled with nail clippings. You are a pack rat. You need help. I gave you a number a few months ago for ‘Hoarders Anonymous.’ Do you still have it?” “What do you think?” Nate said with a small smile. Of course he still had it. He still had everything somewhere. Wren smile back, weakly, but it was still a smile. “I’ll tell you what,” she said calmly, “you agree to go to the hoarder meetings...” “Yeah?” Nate said. “And mark every single box with a big red `G’... and we'll have the movers throw it all in the new garage.” “Wren!” Nate exclaimed. “Are you serious?” “But that's all the space you get,” she warned him. “None of it comes in the house. I'm not going to be tripping over your old phone books and rotting jack-o-lanterns anymore.” “Hot diggity ding dong! You got a deal!” Nate sang as he ran out of the room. “I'm going to find that red marker.” Wren looked up as one of the movers entered carrying a clipboard. “We got all the stuff from the kitchen,” he said. “Where does all this stuff go?” “Oh, anything marked with a big red "G" is garbage. You can leave it on the curb. Or better yet set fire to it.” Wren laughed a blood-chilling laugh and walked out of the room, leaving the puzzled mover to scratch his head. He grabbed the nearest box and headed for the door, taking a curious look inside as he did. “Oh cool,” he said in surprise, “toilet paper tubes!” |