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Moving On

In middle age, scaling down brings new energy, clarity and time

Looking back on it, we probably shouldn't have posted the "For Sale" sign in front of our house the morning of our son's high-school-graduation party. He was a good sport about moving from the house he'd lived in since he was 4, but still . . .

It was just that we'd miraculously found a city condo we agreed on, the garden looked its best in June, and my husband suspected the real-estate market was at its peak. Turns out he was wrong, but the house sold in three days. Then we were really up against it.

My husband was the one who was in such a hurry to move into something smaller. If a house coming up on its 50th year hadn't burned him out on maintenance, my big and complicated garden finished him off. He was tired of hauling mulch and commuting from the suburbs to downtown. Up until the moment of signing the papers, I'd considered moving into a city condo a third the size of our house as nothing more than a "someday" theory. But he was ready to go. I hoped moving would prove antidote to empty-nest sadness. As middle-age changes go, it seemed fairly benign.

Yet our guests at the graduation party were incredulous. Most proclaimed they weren't yet "ready" for a condo, as if such a move meant you must be too old and creaky for anything else. This attitude continues to puzzle me. It's made me feel younger to shed a big house and garden, to have less to care for. Two years later I still get a kick out of walking around the corner for groceries or a yoga class, having dozens of restaurants and theaters close by. I'm almost as thrilled by the novelty of it all as the dog, who gets excited every time the elevator stops on our floor.

Our home in Lake Forest Park was one of those sprawling 1950 ramblers, now called Mid-century Modern, with two full floors. There was plenty of space for a Ping-Pong table and piano, and for teenagers to hang out downstairs where we couldn't hear them. Space we didn't need anymore. Unfortunately, there were so many roomy closets and cupboards that for years I'd just stuck stuff away out of sight.

I decided the only way we'd be able to live comfortably in a small space was to de-clutter, so I set in sorting and tossing. What a great excuse to get rid of gifts I'd never wanted, stuff I was tired of, all that kid paraphernalia. Our son and daughter squealed when I pointed out they now had more storage room than we did, but they took their boxes with them. Dozens of trips to Goodwill and a couple of garage sales later, I realized how much trouble it is to divest yourself of the accumulation of years.

Ironically, it was my husband, the man so hot to downsize, who clung to stuff. He felt the need to find a good home for things I would have dropped off at Value Village. We tracked down a school district that took his old saxophone to refurbish for students, and the Salvation Army accepted his ancient pickup as a donation (thank you!). His "Visible V8" engine and a few other objects too dear to part with now live in a box labeled "Greg's Treasures" in our Langley garage.

So here's the confession. We also bought a small house on Whidbey Island — but both house and condo add up to less square footage than our old house. I'm determined its single-car garage won't become a storage unit. My garden is at the Langley place, along with our bikes and kayaks, but no junk.

Still, most of the time my husband, terrier and I live in 1,360 square feet, which turns out to be more pleasure than deprivation. We built a wall of bookshelves with a panel that slides across the TV and stereo, the mess of CDs and DVDs. Sports on television and rock music were the biggest aggravations, solved by iPods and a second TV in the guest room. We may get along well enough to share limited space, but that doesn't mean we like each other's music.

Mostly we both appreciate the compact clarity of the place, and life in the city. Our cars stay in the garage for days at a time, and we're thinking about trying to get by with one. I can clean the whole flat in the time it used to take me to wash the floors in our house. My husband marvels that he only needs to plug the vacuum in two places to reach every corner of the place. I've gotten so that the thought of having rooms I don't use every day bothers me. Mostly, living small feels like a luxurious gift of time.

I do worry that we might end up tunneling through books and magazines, but I'm cutting down on the book-buying habit. Which means my library card is getting a workout, but that's OK because our neighborhood branch is within easy walking distance.

Valerie Easton is a Seattle freelance writer. Her e-mail address is valeaston@comcast.net.

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