Moving out in Ottawa

Apparently I’ve learned that leaving town for 6 months requires quite a bit of prep work. Understatement of the year. Adding to the chaos of thoughts and organisation for this trip, I’ve had to add the never ending paperwork and documentation needed to apply for a placement agency for my nursing contract in April. After this traveling bit, we plan (my traveling partner, Jack, also a nurse) on working in a smaller, more remote town for another 3 months. When Jack suggested we do 3 months in Africa, followed by 3 months in a northern Canadian town (instead of the original 6 months of traveling plan), it made perfect sense at the time! Now, it’s just a lot of very strategic packing, keeping our cold weather stuff accessible while we sweat our buns off in East Africa. As for the trip, I’ve been organizing my things (mostly day dreaming) for 2 months now; vaccinations, police record’s checks, moving out of our apartment, searching and reserving a storage unit, passport photos, my job, my friend’s wedding at my return, etc. And yes, I’ve had to plan for my friend’s wedding at the end of June, because when one move’s into a storage unit, one needs to keep a decent suit accessible for such events. And I have yet to finish a single chapter of the travel book.

My job in Ottawa is all settled. My application for a nursing licence in another province is underway. Now there’s the apartment. 2 days ago was the “big move”! And I say big move, but considering the size of the rental unit I reserved, it was more like the “holly crap this will never work” yet “let’s pretend like this was planned” move. My wonderful 5×10 storage, which I was told by a few people would be sufficient, is now holding a 2 bedroom/2 persons apartment’s worth of furniture and boxes. I’m just not looking forward to the day I have to unpack that thing. I think I’ll wear a helmet for all the boxes stacked 9 feet high.

It is incredible the amount of things one can leave behind after moving. I keep going back hoping to clean up and give my keys back to the landlord but instead find myself filling my car up only to return to pick up more stuff. Food from the pantry – do I keep it for my return? do I donate? do I give to my family? Food from the fridge – who gets it? Freeze everything? These are the questions that actually keep me up at night. My mind works in ridiculous ways. It’s 3am, and I can’t sleep because I can’t figure out who in my family eats the most mustard?

Now that I’m well set up in my mom’s guest bedroom, taking over every nook in the house (and some space at my wonderful, amazing, incredible sister’s house) to store the things a 5×10 storage couldn’t hold, I can finally concentrate on the trip itself. Go over my packing. Maybe even finish reading about Kenya, since we are landing there. Next week – VISAs! I love paying 100$US just to set foot in a country. Best part is – most of the countries that charge Canadians for Visas, only do it as retaliation because of what we charge them. Got to love borders.Read more