PCSing (part 2) — the moving truck's trailer didn't burn up

© 2019 Peter Free

 

14 July 2019

 

 

It ain't all cupids and roses

 

Military PCSing can aggravate a grating awareness of differences in spousal characters.

 

 

Some things never change?

 

PCSing part 2. (Part 1 is here.)

 

Here we are. Back where we started.

 

Owned by gobs of things.

 

 

Our post-PCS rental home is (allegedly) too small

 

I introduced the "stuffed burrow" idea, here.

 

 

Yup . . .

 

My wife was awake all last night, stressing over where to put the Clutter Rat Collection:

 

 

which (sadly, from my perspective)

 

didn't burn up on the highway

 

or

 

fall off the imaginary container ship

 

(given that this was just an overland move from Texas to California)

 

and now —

 

the Collection is (lamentably) with us again

 

clamoring for space in this next rental house,

 

which has

 

a smaller garage

 

and

 

fewer and smaller closets

 

than both previous such . . .

 

 

Sigh.

 

 

Talk about marital discord

 

The poor, dear woman wanted me to commiserate with her pain.

 

Especially so:

 

 

after I had figuratively shouted

 

(for the umpteenth time in our marital existence)

 

"If you would just get rid of excess and unused items, the problem would solve itself!"

 

 

Yes, I know

 

Your definition of necessity is mine of excess.

 

Those are the differences in character that I mentioned, at the outset.

 

 

Part of the glitch that completely sets me off . . .

 

. . . is that she does not easily "approve" me getting rid of my own crap.

 

 

"It's ours, you know."

 

 

I suspect that her rationale — for the "ours" statement — has more to do with having a club to hold over me. It justifies her own volume of excess.

 

 

"You have as much as me!"

 

 

(A bold-faced untruth, if I ever saw one.)

 

 

This justification gets trotted out, every time the Pack Rat subject arises.

 

 

I label the "clutch and never let go" trait — as "getting in one's own way"

 

And, like many couples, after decades together, some things become monumentally irritating.

 

Keep in mind that, she lies sleepless over the issue, concerning where to put our First World belongings.

 

But, at the same time, she is still determined to own them. Seemingly so, unto Eternity.

 

This struggle continues between us. Even after I repeatedly tell her that I need to de-size in preparation for my own departure from this Vale of Tears. I do not want her, my daughter, or my son-in-law — having to cope with mounds of purposeless Pete's-gone crap.

 

One would think that our recent experiences:

 

 

laboriously (day after day)

 

physically (and painfully) sorting through

 

and

 

disposing of

 

annoyingly voluminous,

 

house-filling piles of

 

"nobody wants it" stuff

 

(which had belonged to her parents) —

 

would have weakened their daughter's inherited Pack Rat inclinations.

 

 

But no.

 

Not a whit.

 

This is still being demonstrated — even after we had previously agreed to divest ourselves of much of our own mess-a-mounds.

 

That was just a month ago. The agreement having been reached, while said crap was being packed up (to come here) piece by interminable (late night) piece.

 

 

Never gone?

 

Those heaps of "supposed to go away" clutter are suddenly back.

 

And on the to-be-insured against theft and destruction and list.

 

OMG.

 

 

The moral? — Passing time's (Pete-croaking) pressure is . . .

 

. . . motivating me against my customary, spouse-comforting compassion.

 

And instead, in favor of "manly" — solution-producing — independence of action.

 

Sometimes, you've just had enough.

 

 

If you can't get out of your own way,

at least get out of mine.

 

 

Til death do us part.