An Unintended Nomad

HERE, THERE, ANYWHERE

I began a somewhat nomadic period in my life when I began college in 1962, living in three different dormitories with three different roommates, an off campus studio apartment, then a gracious Victorian mansion divided into apartments. After my despicable boyfriend cleared out our unit of all significant possessions in a midnight massacre—both his, mine and ours—I traveled to future destinations with nothing more than a suitcase.

After I migrated north, I slept on a cot at my aunt’s house in Brookline, found a furnished Beacon Hill apartment with a roommate, then moved into an Allston apartment after we had a falling out over boyfriends.

I returned to New Jersey for a summer in a large old house with an ever-changing group of ten or so of my nomadic peers, then back to my bedroom at my parents’ home during my law clerkship, and finally to Manchester, Massachusetts. I was married there in 1972 under the weeping willow tree at our two bedroom, one bathroom ranch.

Ten different places in ten years.

Recounting these many moves, I surprise myself with the frequency of geographical change, but even more with the absence of belongings other than the clothing in my suitcase and on my back. I think of the young woman I was then, seamlessly moving from place to place, schools, jobs, relationships, goals. A twenty-something experimenting with endless possibilities.

I marked my territory as a nomad, the three hundred miles of the Northeast corridor between New Brunswick, New Jersey and north of Boston.

And at the end of each of these chapters in my early travels, I packed my earthly possessions and moved on. I never had to rent a U-Haul.

MIDLIFE OASIS

At twenty-eight, after the willow tree uprooted and fell over in an early September hurricane, I set down roots with my new family—two little stepsons, a husband, my tiger cat Columbus, and their golden retriever, Touchy.

During the 70s, 80s, and 90s, we accumulated enough household possessions, both decorative and functional, heavy duty landscaping equipment, and always a power boat, to place us squarely in the acquisitive middle class. Each time we moved, all of it came along.

We left the ranch house for a five year stint in an enormous derelict carriage house that needed more extensive renovation than we could handle. We settled into what became the family homestead in Essex for nearly twenty-five years.

The structure, on ten acres and built in 1956, was solid as a bomb shelter, built with steel-reinforced poured concrete floors, ceilings, and roof, and concrete block for walls inside and out. The steel baseboard heating system belonged in a factory, not a house. I joked that the kitchen belonged in a prison, with its large white utilitarian porcelain sinks, with concrete block walls painted a sickly light green. The pressboard acoustical tiles glued to the ceiling were water-stained from moisture seeping through the cement over the years.

Even so, we put in an offer for this unusual property while it was buried under the snows of the Blizzard of ’78. We fell in love at first sight with the modernist Bauhaus architecture, a misunderstood style for typical New England home buyers who seek historical charm and warmth.

When we moved in the early spring, the snow and ice on the roof began to thaw. We placed buckets in the living room while water flooded the linoleum glued to the cement floors. I understood then why the prior owners hadn’t installed carpeting. In those days, home inspections were cursory.

In the 1990s, we closed up my mother’s house and shipped her household contents up from New Jersey. She didn’t want most of it after all, so we kept it—simply because we had room. When Aunt Sarah from Utica died, we inherited her monster steel-framed convertible couch with the itchy brown wool upholstery.

Now I live in a ranch house with my stepson. The house is not considered large at 1600 square feet, but it has a full basement that spans the entire length with ample room for every item we dragged here from the cement house.

A widely publicized 2014 study in the Los Angeles Times claimed that the average American household contains 300,000 items. I’m thinking that it wouldn’t be such a big problem to live with one-tenth of that, but I’d prefer even less.

BREAKING NEWS: LOCAL RESIDENT FILLS TWENTY-YARD DUMPSTER

I recently demolished a sagging porch from the side of the house. The carpenters brought in a huge red dumpster and said I could add my own stuff to the construction debris. I decided to empty the entire basement.

The project gathered momentum as my stepson and I spent weeks tearing through stacks and shelves of accumulated items of the material culture of the 20th and 21st centuries.

Some examples of basement contents that we threw into the big red dumpster: a pair of crutches from my sprained ankle in 1980; dozens, maybe hundreds, of wire hangers from the dry cleaners for my career suits and blouses; boxes of unread issues of Architectural Digest from the ‘90s; the itchy brown couch; dozens of plastic containers with matching tops missing; plastic lids with matching bottoms missing; a battered old suitcase without wheels; aluminum beach chairs with shredded plastic webbing; hundreds of cassette tapes stored in shoe boxes for twenty years; and, the busted cassette player.

We swept the cellar broom clean, the reward for our labors. A bonus—I found a grocery bag filled with my son’s 1980’s comic books and sold them to the nice guys at Paper Asylum in Beverly for $150.00.

After the big cleanup, I advertised a yard sale for Saturday morning. Older folks stopped by to browse the familiar collectibles from their own childhood. Roommates or young couples bought up wall mirrors, candlesticks, bed frames, end tables, and lamps, amused at interesting vintage pieces like colorful Fiesta ware dishes. Touristy watercolors I bought in Martinique. My grandmother’s ornate dishware with gold-leaf trim that I’ve never liked and never used. Steel filing cabinets from my law office. Hairdryers and hydraulic chairs from Paul’s beauty salon. Vintage purses and hats I had collected from the white elephant table at church fairs.

Now it’s their turn to stake their claims in the places they will call home. I pass along objects new and interesting to them, no longer useful to me. It’s been easier than I expected to reduce down from the collections I sought out, invested in, and carefully maintained. I don’t feel connected to them anymore.

Even so, I’m not anywhere near the point where I can pack up my tent and steal away with all of my worldly goods in the middle of the night. Much less fill just a suitcase or two with the basics for my entire life.

A SPARTAN ENVIRONMENT

My niece and family don’t acquire much by way of material possessions in their city apartment. No TV, no landline, no car, no collections, no appliances outside of the galley kitchen. They live in a one bedroom unit, garaging the Uppa-Baby stroller in the front hallway and their bicycles in the bedroom closet.

When I visit, I’ll sleep on a sofa about as long and narrow as a dorm bed. I stash my carry-on suitcase in a corner and plug my cables into the outlet. I bring exactly what’s needed for the specific length of my stay. Unburdened by responsibility for a house, a car, an office, a schedule, shoveling snow or mowing the grass, I savor the sense of “lightness of being.” I taste freedom.

Enjoying the solitude of later evening when the family is asleep, I contemplate the next step—to resist impulsive or excessive acquisition in the first place.

TAKING ON CHANGE, AGAIN

I start on experiments with smaller measures. In my current travels, I no longer buy souvenirs for myself or gifts for others. I enjoy the people, the food, the customs, the art and music, glimpses of history, the natural beauty, the urban activity.

I yield to the fascination of the colorful and original crafts and products but pass on the purchase. I soon forget about an object fleetingly desired in the marketplace. The overall rich experience of travel itself takes hold.

Airline policies set a new tone, now that the fee for the first piece of checked-in luggage on most domestic flights is thirty dollars. This forces a modified approach to travel. I only use about a quarter of what I pack anyway, repeatedly wearing just a few favorite pieces. This tells me something. Before departure, I scrutinize my little bureau on wheels to weed out excess.

In doing so, I reconsider what I view as so necessary to have around me wherever I am—and wonder if the fearless nomad in me is still accessible.