The enclosed back porch is now a staging area.

What once was a pleasant summer room with its jalousie windows is now a curiosity shop, full of the leftovers, the no-longer-neededs, of my life. The chestnut table we used to sit at with the girls when they were small is covered in detritus: old toys, unwanted books, Christmas decorations, artwork, unused tools and wood, broken vacuums.

Once, the table hosted barbecued chicken and roast corn-on-the-cob and summer brew and dear friends and family. We had plans for the porch, back then. We would paint it, put down a new floor, build a deck extending into the backyard.

Every day I am more at ease with the fact that these plans will be someone else’s plans, in the end.

Our life is changing, suddenly, surprisingly. When the snow has made it clear it will not be back, I will finally get the cardboard boxes I’ve been speaking of for several years. I will sift through the junk that’s taken over the old porch, I will box it up, I will send it all on its way with an “estate liquidator,” and I will laugh at the thought that anything of what we were and what we owned could be considered “estate.” It’s too late now for a yard sale. Besides, there’s no yard.

I am ready to let it all go. I am ready to begin again. I will kiss the top of stuffed animal heads (I am sentimental, after all), but I won’t think of the possible eBay income, the repurposing that could happen, if I put my mind to it.

I don’t want to “repurpose.” I don’t want the chore of trying to describe the objects that no longer matter. Selling points have never been my strong suit, and I am not about to start now.

When the porch is finally emptied, I’ll make my way into the basement, and repeat the entire process. Then: the house. A new life, a new kind of family is on the horizon. I can see it now; I can just about touch it. When I close the back porch door, and then, the front door, for the last time, I will not look back.

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