So, everything is a bit topsy-turvy.

I’m currently trying to get a position in London through work. If it works out, it will literally be a dream come true. Maybe not necessarily the job (my dream job is, after all, driving a train for the Underground. I don’t think they sponsor visas, though), but certainly the location, and I do like what I do for a living (even though it’s not driving a train. I mean, trains! Best ever!). We’ll see how it goes. I’m admittedly a little afraid to say anything publicly in case I jinx it. Nothing is certain until the paperwork is signed, of course. But I’ve gotten the cats microchipped, and I’ve started selling off my stuff, Just In Case the stars align. Y’all know how it goes.

It’s a little peculiar how this feels though. On the verge of, as I said, having a dream come true — comes tension. It’s all the stupidest of things. Should I sell xyzpdq? What if I don’t get the job and want my xyzpdq? I had that happen with my drum carder. For those of you who aren’t yarn spinners, a drum carder is a rather pricey gadget that you use to prepare fiber for spinning. I bought mine a couple of years ago, and I loved it… I used it to prep art yarn batts, or prep fleece, or just generally make fiber for yarns for fun. I saved up for it, $25 a month for quite a while, to be able to buy a KitchenAid, and in the end I decided I would get more use from a carder than a KitchenAid, and I finally got it and I loved it… and a few weeks ago, I sold it. Because it wasn’t important enough to make the cut. If I pull this off, I want to pull it off in the least baggagey way possible, and that means not carting around boxes of shit I’ve carried with me since forever. I sold it to two friends, who are actually the fine ladies behind YarnCon (which, if you are a Chicagoan and a knitter or a spinner, you should certainly be familiar with!), and when Natalia picked it up from me she was practically rubbing her hands in glee at getting to process a particular fleece she had. But, all the same, there’s no amount of sending something you love on to a new home where it will be loved that cancels out the sense of pre-emptive regret, the “what if this doesn’t happen, and I’ve sold my drum carder for no good reason.” The price isn’t the most major factor (though it was definitely a sale at a loss) so much as it is, in economic terms, the opportunity cost. The “what-if” cost, the hedge against failure. The things that I have, I bought for a reason; if I sell them off and I wind up losing out on the London opportunity, I’ve not only lost out on my dream but also on the things I had before I was tempted at all.

I suppose it’s a lesson in materiality. I try not to be overly attached to material goods. I live in a small apartment, and I don’t have a lot of stuff in general. I had a CD collection which I did prize, and quite a lot of vinyl for a dilettante, and a fair number of books. Those are mostly gone now. The CDs are nearly all gone, but for one last box that I’ll haul off to sell; and the books are down to about one shelf on a bookcase, which — the more that I think about it — can be cut down even further; and the vinyl, well, maybe I’ll bequeath that to Michael. The more I think about things, I really think I can move with just a couple bags of clothing, my spinning wheel (only that because a Lendrum is pretty expensive in the UK), and my bike (because I love Ella Mae so, and she’s all tricked out with perfectly fitted aerobars and fancy waterproof German saddlebags and everything, these days). But it’s still a little confounding to try and balance the desire to get rid of extraneous stuff against the desire to have all of said extraneous stuff until the last possible minute because, after all, everything could always fall through.

I really, really hope everything doesn’t fall through. For so many reasons, and the stuff is the least of them.