Dealing (again) with moving and "home"

As I've said multiple times on this blog, little things catch me off guard. Today, I experienced it when packing up Christmas decorations. Until today, I had always used two Moravian Bookshop bags to pack up my decorations, which didn't consist of more than a tree topper and tree decorations. After a few years of various gifts from family, however, I now have more home decorative items, too -- and as a result, this year I realized that the Bookshop bags just weren't big enough. Plus, with all the moving in my future, boxes would be much more logical.

Most of you are probably not familiar with the Moravian Bookshop (http://www.moravianbookshop.com/ ), the oldest continuously operational bookshop in the US (since 1745). It is intimately tied in my mind to Christmas; the majority of my Christmases have been spent in Bethlehem, PA with my grandparents. We would always have a trip downtown to see the "old city" lit up and a browse through the bookshop. I have annual ornaments from the bookshop through 2001 when they stopped making them for some reason. Thus, packing away my Christmas ornaments in a Bookshop bag seemed seasonally and sentimentally appropriate.

As I packed my ornaments and other knick knacks away in two Pampers Cruisers Size 4 boxes, I actually teared up a bit. Then I packed - and unpacked - and packed again - and unpacked again - the two Bookshop bags which I think must be at least six years old and have served me well all these years. In the end, I decided to put the bags in my "nice bag" pile, perhaps to use to bring a pie over to a friend's house at a later date (they have really nice, big, flat cardboard-reinforced bottoms; great for a pie plate).

Logically, I know this makes sense. It would be quite ridiculous to have two bags packed into boxes and shipped around the world, only to be unpacked for a few short weeks each year - and even then, when I unpacked them, what would I do with them? And it provided me with yet another example as to how, in this transitory lifestyle we've chosen, I have to make decisions between logic and sentiment. Logic doesn't always win out, just by the way :)