What to take with us.

Three days to departure. House chaos (check) Kids chaos (check) Charles ratty (check) Sonja lucky to have Charles (check) Boxes everywhere (check) Checks-lists being lost (I put it next to the microwave, the kids must have moved it) General mayhem and bedlam (check)
Not calm (no) Not peaceful (not) Enough time to do everything (no) Enough space (no)

I pack well.
Packing a months equipment into a boot before heading off into the Namib dessert for a camping trip, and ending up fitting a pair of binoculars into a perfectly sized space, a perfect fit, why - it gives me goose pimples.
I love packing.
And you mess with my packing system at your peril.
Keep the hell away.
I'll get what you need.
You don't mess with the way I lay my wood on a fire, and you don't mess with my packing.
Obviously.
I still have a picture in my head of Robin Knox Johnson, the lone sailor about to head off for the first solo, unsupported circumnavigation of the world in his yacht. He is on the jetty, surrounded by a mountain of supplies. All carefully calculated to the last tin. The last needle.
Beautiful. Exquisite.
I can add one thing at this junction.
I can promise you, he did not have children on the jetty.
Packing with kids is very, very trying.
Packing with kids who are home from school all day is even worse.
Trying to reduce your entire life into what you can fit into the family car and a small trailer starts off as being cathartic, but quickly turns you psychotic.
Luckily for the kids it is illegal in South Africa to bury them alive, sign them over to the neighbours, or dangle them upside down from the top of the stairs.
Our new cottage suddenly seems a very small place to be moving to.
We have been absolutely ruthless packing. To fit enough to make a small cottage functional, while having enough of the basics is not easy.
And we have stuck to the basics:
Solar system and batteries - tick (enough to operate laptops and communicate)
Tools and spares - tick (we need to build a loo, shower and a long list of other things urgently)
Fishing kit - tick (we have to catch fish, three meals per week are earmarked as seafood)
Pots, pans and kitchenware - tick (very little of anything, just enough to cook and get by)
Wood, buckets, drums, pipes - tick (we need that shower and loo)
Beds and bedding - tick (one short, two kids must share)
Gas fridge - tick
Two plate cooker - tick
Gas Bottles - tick
Clothes - tick
Kids homeschooling material - tick
Suddenly we are out of space, damn.
What to take out.
What to leave.
And when we think that we have the balance just right, its one thirty A.M, you can't see straight, you hit your bed feeling good, and the next afternoon when you return home from work the kids have got creative with your packing.
There will be no smiling final photo just prior to departure.
I promise you.
The worst part is. The worst part.
We have got so little. So very little to take with us.
The worst part is.
It is still so much more than everybody else in the village.
So I am going to have to feel guilty moving in with what little we have.
There will be no Kudos.
It is like cooking without an audience - you may as well eat toast and egg.
I remain sane by reminding myself that I can still at least pack perfectly, and feel excited, in a very satisfying TETRIS way, when I slip the last tin of paint perfectly into position.
If you knew how little you could take.
You would freak out.