Benjamin, I can't lift these boxes.

I'll be waving my hands
Watching you drown, watching you scream, quiet or loud
And maybe you should sleep
And maybe you just need a friend
As clumsy as you've been there's no one laughing
You will be safe in here
you will be safe in here

The thrill this week in grade three is to pull your mouth open wide with two fingers and say things like "puck" and "apple".

Sigh.

In grade six the trend is to decorate your jeans with memories written in sharpie, a la Sisterhood of the traveling pants. I may join that one. I already lead the threes in swearing so I think I have elementary school covered tenfold.

We are surrounded by cardboard boxes, markers, packing tape and lists. Contracts to print and sign, calls to make, addresses to change, hotels to book, flights to organize, pets to calm, children to reassure and...

...one princess sitting at a scrubbed table with a borrowed glass full of cheap white wine, near tears and near smiles at the effort in place to relocate many lives all at once, and memories too.

It rained all day today and I can see the tops of my lilac bushes again. I scraped away the ice in front of the garage door so that I don't have another session of stars and sparrows, flat on my back on the cement floor of the garage, wondering how I got there.

I'm favoring myself physically because if I hurt myself or pull anything I won't be able to pack. Time is at a premium right now, I am writing tonight from the dinner table, on precious batter power while Henry finishes his homemade pizza in the dining room and Ruth is long gone, off to watch television while she waits for us to be ready to head outside to walk the dog. Once I get the children organized and in pajamas playing Warcraft with Ben across the miles I will finish the calculations for my taxes and call them in tomorrow. Then I can put all of that away and concentrate on coordinating this move. Which sometimes seems so very easy and straightforward and other times becomes unbearably complicated and impossible.

But I have done so much. And I'm going to list the things because I could use a little pep talk with my contraband wine:

1. I refinished a hardwood floor.
   
2. I painted several rooms, top to bottom.
3. I mudded and finished a newly gyproc-sheeted room.
   
4. I hired a realtor and sold a house (almost forty showings in four days).
   
5. I hired a mover.
6. I had my car repaired and negotiated a free rental car for the duration.
7. I kept the three of us safe.
8. I lived without Ben for almost three months, no small feat for someone who is afraid of everything and who only breathes or sleeps in his arms.
   
9. I kept my computer alive. There's no resuscitation order on this thing. It clearly wants to die. I need to give it permission and I don't plan to do that for a bit yet.
   
10. We made brownies. They ruled the universe. Then we tossed the rest of the baking supplies.
    

I can't wait to call the airline and find out there's some screwy thing with bringing the pets. I can't wait for the car to be damaged on the rail to British Columbia and I can't wait for a host of new street names to pronounce and the mile-long list of donair and ramen joints Ben is going to to take me to so I can sample food in a foodie city for the first time ever. Does Pacific spiney lobster taste as good as Atlantic? What about the scallops? What about the Thai? The Thai has to be good and I'm never sure if what I learned to love here was authentic or just bastardized quasi prairie-Thai.

I will soon find out. Two weeks from tomorrow.

Oh, Jesus Christ. Bring more wine then, I have work to do.