I am standing outside my apartment. Three people are inside, packing up everything. Later some other people will evaluate everything to decide whether is it fine, fixable, or fucked.
It is humbling. A life summed up in boxes and tagged large items, to be inspected by some disinterested third party. Is this who I am? A PS4, some boardgames, and an exercise bike? At some points in my life it seems like I answered yes. No, not “answered”. That implies a decision. More like passively accepted society telling me who I was.
People seem surprised with how calm I am about the fire. And I guess I am. But the loss of things isn’t too terrible. Sure, a few precious things are gone. But now I have the opportunity to be mindful.of what I bring back into my life. It is easier to say “No, thank you” than “Goodbye”.
An Intentional Journey 
Thank you so much for being there. Meanwhile I’m at the doctor’s trying to get some meds replaced and asking about my problems with vomiting and breathing funny. Some is from stress but some might be from breathing gunky air.
I too am grateful for how well things are going, considering. My friend the former arson investigator knew just how to advise us – I have no words. And the team leader from Service Master has been doing this for 8 years and yesterday she looked at the board games and told us what they had cost off the top of her head. And she knows about derby too and as I understand it, the derby equipment is already being worked on.
Unlike yours, my clothes and costumes are still in there – well maybe by now people have started to bring them downstairs. The office contains what’s left (after PREVIOUS fires and floods, the most recent 4 years ago) of my “output” in the pre-internet era. Mostly in plastic storage boxes with a variety of lids, permeable and not. Based on my experience in the past, the ones on top sometimes sacrifice themselves to save the others. I hope I’ll be able to photograph a few things (before letting go) so that in future the pictures can jog my memory of the ups and downs.
Since I’m recording here: the bulk of the books were not in this apartment; they’re split between two storage locations. The ones in this apartment (some precious) were all related only to projects I am currently working on.
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