Packing Up A Life: The Things I Can't Leave Behind

We’re packing up a life.

Not just a house.

Not just boxes.

But a life.

And let me tell you, it’s a strange kind of magic — deciding what makes the cut. What gets wrapped in bubble wrap and labelled “precious”?

What gets quietly slipped into the bin with a whispered apology?

You know, it’s not the expensive things that stop me in my tracks.

It's the little shamrock brooch that belonged to my Mum, given to me by my brother when I was ill.

The chipped teapot I never use, but we bought when we moved into our first house together.

The wooden spoons me and my girls used as microphones for our kitchen sing-a-longs!

As we prepare to move to France — to step into a dream we dared to speak out loud — I find myself asking:

What am I really taking with me? And what am I finally ready to leave behind?

The Odd Things I’m Taking

• My purple notebook, frayed at the edges, bursting with half-formed poems and hopeful scribbles. I swear if I even attempted to leave it behind it would grow legs and follow me!

• A mug with a chip and a memory

• Adele’s favourite stick (yes, we’re those people)

• My very dog-eared copy of the Oxford Rhyming Dictionary

  
  

They don’t make sense in a moving checklist. But they make sense to me.

The Things I’m Leaving — and Why

• A shelf of books I kept out of guilt rather than love

• Clothes that never quite felt like me

• Old notebooks full of second-guessing and self-doubt

• The idea that dreams are for other people, or younger people, or braver people

• The weight of other people's opinions

  
  

I’m leaving behind the narrative that says "You missed your chance." Because I didn’t. It was just waiting for me to be ready to step into it.

The Non-Negotiables

• My poetry

• My sense of humour

• My unapologetically hippy heart

• Hubby (who now believes in signs, even if he won’t quite admit it)

• The belief that joy is a perfectly valid reason to start over

  
  

A Pocket Poem: What I’m Taking

I’m taking the books I never finished

And the dreams I nearly did

I’m taking a cup that fits just right

and all the things I kept well hid

I’m leaving behind the guilt, the grind

The cluttered drawers of ‘must’ and ‘should’

I’m packing light, but full of life

And for once -

I know that’s good

Here’s to every late bloomer, quiet dreamer, and wandering soul who finally decided to start chasing what tugs at their sleeve.

Let this be proof that it’s never too late to begin again.

#RetirementIsAWholeNewChapter #NeverTooOldToDream #DreamsCanComeTrue #RetiringToFrance #PagesFromThePurpleNotebookFrenchEdition