Today

Right now I'm sitting on someone else's couch eating yogurt out of the tub that I have over-generously sprinkled granola directly into.

I'm not even sure if they have granola and yogurt where we're going.

90% of our things are on a truck somewhere. In three days they'll be on a boat. Think nice, calm seas thoughts for us.

We have suitcases, inexpertly packed with some things we need and mostly things we couldn't bear to throw away and too many pairs of pajamas.

In the next fifteen minutes we're going to drug our cats, put harnesses on them and put them in carriers. They'll be allowed out in about 12 hours.

Our first stop will be the KLM counter where we'll beg and plead our case to be allowed to sit next to each other so that we're not 10 rows apart on the biggest, most emotional flight of our lives. I'll gladly take a middle seat if it means we don't have to do this alone.

The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of food and friends and board games and running (literally and metaphorically). At some point my emotions shut down -- I am no longer excited or scared or sad or anything, I am just a pile of cells waiting for the inevitable moment when it all hits me and I become a giant pile of goo (which is yet another reason I shouldn't really be sitting next to two strangers on the airplane).

In a few days I'll be able to thoughtfully process what the past few weeks (and 10 years) in Chicago have meant to me. But until then, think safe, quiet travel thoughts for us. We'll see you on the other side of the Atlantic.

T-Minus Ten Days

Here we are. We're moving to Amsterdam in ten days. Literally, actually, ten days.

Everyone knows. Bosses, besties, facebook. We sold our apartment (insert one million praise hand emojis). We sold our guest room furniture and our grill. We have resisted the temptation to buy anything new.

And yet, it doesn't quite feel real yet.

We had a good bye party with too much food and the exact right amount of laughter, our people crowded around our dining room table just where we like them. But it didn't feel like a good bye party. It just felt like a party, like all the ones that came before. There was no sense of it being the last one.

We toured up and down the east coast with the goal of saying goodbye to family and friends, but we were so busy catching up and eating everything that the goodbyes were rushed and didn't quite feel real.

But it is all very real. And in 10 days. The airplane will be real. And the cat carriers. And the four suitcases and two backpacks...

...and that's where my imagination stops because I have been so caught up in the leaving of Chicago, it has left no room for what might be in store when we get off the airplane on the other side of the pond.

So we focus on what lays just ahead of us. All the lasts and the finals and the one mores.  My goal is to take pictures, accept hugs, and remember that nothing is as important as soaking up as much Chicago and joy as I can before that plane takes off.