Adventures in Unpacking

When I think about it, I have pretty much been moving or in transition since 2001, when I graduated from high school.  I moved every year in college: from the dorm, to my parents' house, to my sorority house, back to my parents' house, back to the sorority house, back to my parents' house again, back to the sorority house again, to a summer house in Austin, and finally... one more spin in the sorority house before I graduated in 2005 (Hey, rent is pricey in Austin and those Delta Gammas were giving me a deal I could not pass up.)  So after those nine moves in four short years, I entered the "real world" and rented my first apartment.  I lived in uptown for almost two years, then moved to Addison for a few years to save money on rent.  When Mark and I got engaged, I moved into my aunt and uncle's house (empty nesters with a big house and an upstairs that was rent free) for six months and then.... finally.... moved into Mark's house in McKinney in 2010.  We always knew we'd only stay in McKinney for a year or two, so that means for the past eleven and a half years, I've bounced around to places I knew were only temporary --- never intending to stay for more than a year or two.

Whew.  That means my stuff has moved around a lot.  I'm pretty clean and organized, but there are definitely a couple boxes that have been following me around for years, never really getting unpacked.  Take for example, the three shoeboxes labeled "make-up." Now that we've moved into this house, I feel like I am finally in a place where I can settle in and find a place for everything.  No more cardboard boxes stuffed in the tops of closets until I have a place with enough room for them.  So I tackled those make-up boxes this evening.  I threw away a lot - I don't know why I feel the need to hang on to half-empty, three year old mascara tubes.  But I kept finding more and more and more nail polish bottles.  When I had gone through all the boxes, I counted up all the nail polish.  I went outside to ask Mark (mowing the yard again, duh) how many bottles of nail polish he thought I owned.

His guess? 32.  I told him to add 42.  Yup, I have 74 bottles of nail polish.

His response?  That I should start painting my own nails from now own. Sigh. He does have a point.