Is there anything more humbling, more exhilerating, more infuriating, more baffling than moving to a smaller house? Seven years ago, my grandfather left his three-story home for the comfort of a 15th-floor one bedroom plus den condo "living space." He left behind scads of furniture, countless self-imposed home improvements, and years of memories: his wife of 60 years, the long-since renovated bedrooms of his now middle-aged children, the comfort of a full backyard garden which he hadn't tended himself for nigh on a decade.
Me, I'm downsizing on a much smaller emotional scale, but the task is simply staggering. My girlfriend and I have a modest two-bedroom place in Burnaby, but are tossing it for the high-falutin' fast pace of 500-square foot digs in Yaletown.
We're wondering which things get the boot, and which make the move with us. We're fighting over what kind of lamp to buy for the bedroom, and what colour accent wall best hides the mediocrity of our existing furniture. We're excitedly planning for more entertaining in our home -- we can join the ranks of Vancouver snobs who refuse to jaunt to the suburbs for anything less than a funeral, parental birthday or stag party.
We're leaving the small, petty problems of suburbian Metrotown for the insignificant, pretty problems of upscale Yaletown. They may not be better people down there, but they're certainly better-dressed.
We're terrified, elated, wide-eyed and cranky. Give us a designer fruit smoothie and a cat-sized dog, and we'll fit right in.
