So, just like when you grieve, the stages are:

1. Denial and Isolation (but also, add Procrastination): As soon as you find out that you're going to move, you look around your house and when you realize that all these things that you have mysteriously acquired over the years (seriously, where'd it all come from though?!) will now have to somehow be removed from said house, you go into instant denial.

To enhance that denial factor, you immediately leave the room and the possessions which are causing you such distress, closing the door behind you on your way out, thus placing said objects in isolation. But shutting the door, you find out, isn't doing much to silence the screams of your panicked conscience, so you enlist your voice of (warped?) reason to drown out your conscience by screaming that 24 are indeed a lot of hours, and therefore you still have plenty of time before your eviction move. Sufficiently calmed, you make yourself a cup of coffee and - when the amount of kitchen appliances and forks (do people really need forks?! Many people around the world eat just fine with their hands) start to stir up your conscience again - you leave the house and decide to have your coffee break outside. 'Cause you need the coffee break before you start all that work, you know. Thus you procrastinate.

2. Anger. After killing two hours on your coffee break (where'd all that time go?), you cautiously venture back into the house. No, you didn't imagine it, because all the knick-knacks are still very much in your house. And in fact, they seemed to have mysteriously multiplied since you've last looked at them. So at this point you get furious with your sentimental self (see? Anger) for keeping all the crap lovely gifts that anyone has ever given you, and you grab trash bags and decide that from now on, you are going to embrace a simple life and adhere to the principles of Zenlike minimalism.

3. Bargaining. After ruthlessly and furiously filling up half a trash bag, and just as you're about to send the hot pink doilies from your Aunt Ethel the same way as the forks and plates (minimalism, remember?), you are filled with sudden remorse and so you remove all the plates and forks and doilies from the trashbag, deciding that you can't live without it after all. That is, until you reemerge from delving the last spoon out of the bottom of the trashbag only to see that your rescued possessions are now in a pile stretching as high as the Eiffel Tower. When you realize that you'll simply have to throw some things away, you start to bargain with yourself: You can keep those National Geographics from 1987 if you get rid of the plates. Or if you chuck the 1999 National Geographics (but you can't! They have that article on Meerkats in the one issue with the adorable photos) you can keep all the wrappers of the chocolates given to you by your first love.

4. Depression. It is around this time, when all your possessions are in piles on the floor, that you are overcome with fatigue and despair. And so you collapse onto the floor, sobbing. Because you are depressed. Very depressed.

5. Acceptance. Hopefully, you reach this phase with some time left before the moving truck arrives. If so, then you turn into a machine and pack your belongings at a head-spinning pace. If, however, the Prozac-induced acceptance overcomes you too late, then you promptly decide that you are embracing minimalism early and then you burn the whole lot.

So, good luck JeAnette... and anyone else who happens to be moving.

In parting, an excerpt from an e-mail I sent out before my last move six months ago:

"The ENORMOUS MOVE is happening tomorrow, so right now I'm in the last throes of packing up and surrounded by the chaotic clutter of boxes in different stages of fullness. And I'm wondering - not for the first or last time, mind you - why on earth books can't be manufactured to be the exact same size for our moving convenience?!?!?

How did all these books sneak into this house to begin with, I ask you!? It's a great mystery to me... the formerly sweet memories of plundering the shelves of Barnes & Noble, giddy with delight, now very vague and suppressed by the dread and frustration of stuffing coffee table books (whoEVER invented those?!) into a box that is just an INCH to short.

But don't worry: I take frequent coffee breaks to ponder these important issues. Actually, I lie down a lot too, THINKING about packing up and all that's left to be done, and hoping that the books will fall from the bookcases and into the open boxes through sheer osmosis. But alas, they remain stubbornly on the shelves...

Why don't I love shoes instead, like a normal girl?!"