My Bags are Packed and I'm Ready to Go

Shalom Chaverim,

Over this past weekend I packed up all my belongings. It's a funny thing, moving. I always imagine I don't own a lot and for some reason take a weird sort of pride in this fact. Perhaps I like to think of myself as able to pick up and leave on a moment's notice, or perhaps it is some Buddhist concept of detachment from the material world. Whatever it is, I always end up realizing that I am much more of a packrat than I thought.

But ironically this also ends up being a good thing in the end. I find lots of old things that I forgot existed that I associate with memories long past. Yesterday I found a picture Brent drew of me on a placemat. It is a caricature to be sure, with a cartoonish nose and a clown's lips, but damn it all if every person I show it to thinks it looks just like me. I also found an old comic strip Dan and I made for the McGill Daily. It was utterly ridiculous, but hey, I'm a published comic artist! I find old remnants of my relationship with Lindsey, I find pictures of my time in Japan, I find edible undies (for real!), I find pieces of me that make me who I am.

But I can't keep all this stuff. It is simply too much. So I have to painfully go through each little memory and decide how important it is to me. Placing value judgments on memories sucks. I threw away Brent's pic, but I kept the comic strip. I threw away the edible undies (they were expired anyway), but kept the pictures of Japan.

It is strange that I am still living this transient lifestyle. I haven't lived in the same abode for more than 2 years since leaving home when I was 17. I've moved between countries several times, too. I moved to Israel after high school, then Maryland, then Montreal, then NYC and now back to Israel. A funny little circle. When, though, do I settle down? When do a finally call a place home? I want to be a part of Israeli society, but I don't even know how to do that, what with my crazy nomadic life.

Or maybe the thing I want to muse on in this post is how memories are carried in life. I always am amazed at how much I can forget in life. I look at one thing - a picture, a postcard, a button, a little slip of paper - and all of a sudden it's like someone turned on a light, or like when you walk into a previously unseen room in a dungeon crawling game and the whole thing becomes unlit on your map. Every time I choose to throw something away, am I forever sealing off that room from my memory? That is a frightening thought.

Anyway, for the next ten days I'll be out of NYC for the holidays. I'll be visiting home and San Francisco to take care of seeing all my family in one fell swoop. Plus, I'll get to see old friends from the DC area and say my goodbyes to them, too. I don't know if being away will provide more or less opportunities to post, but I'll do my best. Thanks for starting to read again, readers. And to the n00bs, welcome!

Shana Tova!