Packing up

EVACUATION NOTICE

Sector IX will be evacuated tomorrow,

Tuesday, January 21, 2025, at 17:00

Food, clothing, and shelter will be provided.

Each individual, regardless of age, may bring no more than one suitcase, which they must carry themselves. Excess luggage will be left behind.

The notice came yesterday afternoon. A simple flyer pushed through the mail slot. She had stood by the front door, reading, and rereading the message, trying to absorb the news, the implication, the reality. Everyone knew that it would happen. They had heard rumors from other sectors, but nobody had heard from those who had left. Nobody knew where they would go, how far they would travel. Everyone had hoped it would be later, rather than sooner. Nobody was prepared to leave their home. How could they?

How could she pack more than seventy ears of living in one suitcase and still carry it? How far would she have to carry it? Would they walk the whole way? What would they have in their new home? Would there be a home or dormitories, or tents? Would there be electricity, phone service, running water? Would they need money, something with which to barter?

What would she take? What could she bring? How to decide?

She walked into her living room. All her adult life she had painstakingly collected the best she could afford at the time. Now after so many years, her home was exactly as she envisioned. The colors, the style, the comfort. It might not be perfect enough for Architectural Digest, but it was perfect for her. How could she walk away from this? This was her identity, her peace, her comfort, her sanctuary.

She looked at the walls and saw her art. There was her first framed piece. She remembered making it. She had been so proud of it. But other pieces, like that one, were technically better. And the one over there, had more emotional value. She remembered when she created it, not long after her father passed. Those were his colors. But then there was also her textile work. Would she bring that quilt? Or this blanket? Would she be able to make more, wherever she’d end up? Maybe she could learn new techniques or teach others.

She wandered into her study. How about her books? Which one or two of the books she had read and carefully saved, alphabetized, and catalogued were more important than others? How about her own stories? Could she carry all of them? Or would she write new ones, read, share, and listen to other people’s stories?

She looked at her kitchen, all her recipes. And smiled, remembering those endless hours, not to mention thousands of dollars spent on experiments, trial and error and eventual successes. How could she leave all that behind? Would she be called upon to cook? Would she have proper ingredients? Or could she share her knowledge, taste different dishes, explore new spices?

Jewelry? She opened the drawer and looked at her collection of handmade pieces picked up at markets around the world. Pieces shamelessly bargained for, remembering the triumph of finding those little gems and bringing them home. The one or two pieces of value she had inherited from her mother, who had gotten them from her mother.

Clothing? This dress? The fabric exquisite, the cut timeless, the fit exact, but not warm enough for January. Or these boots? Lovely, elegant but not comfortable for walking. Her prized dancing shoes, though she didn’t dance anymore.

The flyer had said clothing would be provided, but would she bring one or two special pieces? Which one? How could she choose? Would it be warm where they were going, or would she need to bundle up?

She sat up all night, thinking, planning, and remembering.

She thought back to her childhood. How different life had been then, so simple, so safe. How she had played in the backyard, rarely exposed to the chaos and complications of the world. She remembered learning to juggle, poorly. To jump rope and play tag. Building castles in the sandbox and forts using old blankets and clotheslines.

She thought of her teens, the angst, how nobody had understood her. How she had felt alone, adrift, and insecure. Certain in the knowledge that her problems were unique and unexplainable. She remembered the music, how her parents had hated it. How she defiantly had used earbuds and blocked the world.

And smiled when she thought of her college years. How she had sprung free, let loose and transformed herself. How, when she started her work, she had to curb all that wildness and slowly became her parents.

Early this morning she wandered through her home again, looking at, touching, holding, stroking all she had made and everything she had accumulated. She stopped to think about where and when she had created, found, fallen in love with each item. She thought about what she had learned from each piece, whether it had been a technique or how many failures it had taken before she got it right. She thought of how she would do each one differently if she ever would do it again. Her mind awhirl with possibilities, opportunities and plans. Would it be possible to grow, change, evolve?

Then she had taken pictures of her art, picked some of the snapshots from her photo albums, weeded through and selected her favorite recipes, and stories, uploading them all to her phone. Finally, she had dropped her mother's jewelry, her wallet and the phone in a shoulder bag.

At 16:55, after one last look, she shrugged into her coat, the sensible one with the zip-out lining and closed the door behind her. Stuffing her hands in her pockets, she walked to the street and joined the dozens of people already walking. Most lugging large suitcases, children clutching beloved stuffed animals and dolls. Slouching teens trailed behind, headsets in place, heads bopping to whatever beat, their eyes on what could be their last videos.

She had her memory, her skills, her knowledge, and experience none of which fit in a suitcase.