Why Moving Feels Layered

Moving isn’t just about boxes and addresses. It’s layered — with memories, routines, hopes and the quiet disorientation of starting over.

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Moving is more than just logistical. It’s disorienting because it’s layered.

Logistics are difficult enough to handle during a move. Since moving yesterday, I suspect I’ll be looking for my nasal spray, extra charging cords and socks all weekend. Not to mention my work files, bills and various handouts I brought home from a writers’ conference a couple of weeks ago.

That’s the obvious part of moving – the practical work. Packing boxes. Changing addresses. Contacting utility companies. Finding your underwear.

But under the practical layer are the relational, memory, identity and emotional ones. You carry your history, memories, expectations, hopes and unfinished stories into a new setting – all at the same time.

That becomes obvious when you start packing.

You are forced to touch artifacts from different phases of your life – old journals, clothes and photos. A recent breakup journal might lie next to old concert tickets. Those bump up against photos of friends and loved ones who are no longer alive. A shirt from a season of life you barely remember. A note tucked inside a book. A receipt from a place that doesn’t even exist anymore.

Moving gathers all those scattered fragments and puts them in one room, or sometimes, even the same box.

The disorienting part isn’t just wondering where your socks ended up. It speaks to who you are in a new home.

When you live in a neighborhood for a while, the environment and neighbors become familiar. You know their routines, their vehicles and what to expect. You know what time the kids get home from school, when the parking lot at the apartment complex might fill up and which neighbor likes to chitchat.

Moving to a new neighborhood means giving all that up and leaning into discomfort. Who did we move next to? What noises will wake us up? What routines will become familiar?

As we visited the new house over the last few weeks, we noticed the neighbors across the street like to sit outside. And one of the residents in that home is an elderly woman. That gives me high hopes, given that Clarissa and I will still have both of our mothers with us at the new house.

My mom is 90 years old now, and she’s prone to disorientation due to change, but maybe … just maybe our two mothers and the woman across the street can become friendly. It would certainly be a bonus.

But that’s the thing about carrying hopes into a new place. You have no idea how things will turn out.

Maybe that’s why moving feels heavier than it should. You aren’t just carrying boxes into a new house. You’re carrying the life you’ve built and trusting it can bear fruit in a new place.

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If you enjoy these essays, you might also enjoy one of Lee’s books. When he isn’t writing essays, devotional books or Christian fiction, he is a freelance editor, as well as a freelance journalist who has written hundreds of articles for various newspapers and magazines. He’s also a fan of NASCAR, baseball, tennis, books, movies and coffee shops.

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