UpNorthMinimalist

It’s been an interesting few years. In 2018 my youngest child graduated high school and my significant other and myself at the time decided to move. While packing up the moving truck, and repacking, and repacking again; that was the beginning of my internal thoughts of becoming a minimalist. We moved to Harbor Springs Michigan but that wasn’t the plan. The plan was to live in a pretty nice apartment building in Petoskey, a distance from her job in Harbor Springs, but only about 8 miles one way. The day we checked out the apartment I panicked. It was beautiful, it overlooked the harbor, but it was on the third floor. Granted, a lot of our stuff was in a storage unit but without an elevator, I backed out of the apartment and searched for a house.

The house I found was in Harbor Springs, a beautiful town filled with people with money and attitude, but mostly money. The house was small and we moved in with our stuff, upsetting my significant other because this was not her plan. The landlord, Buck, (who I grew to love later), informed us he would be moving in with us for a few months. The rent was already $1000 a month. After a month we moved next door to a three-bedroom duplex for $900 a month, with plenty of room for our stuff, and proceeded to clear out our storage unit. There we, (for a few months it was a we, but that’s a tale for another day), lived for about a year with myself moving out in July of 2019; our divorce was final in January of the same year.

I chose to move home due to my mother’s broken hip and replacement. By moving home she could leave the nursing home and go back to her apartment. That move had me in a small duplex, a storage unit was needed. I then moved a year later, and again a year later, (twice), then to Wisconsin, then back to Michigan; finally resting in the north woods of Wisconsin. I’m done with moving. The first big move in 2018 had me moving about 30 boxes of just books. This last move was 14 boxes. It was then that I decided that it was time for minimalism.

For those not familiar with minimalism I highly suggest watching the documentary called The Minimalists. The journey from “stuff” to what’s necessary to live is a great journey. My journey began by moving into a 1,000-square-foot trailer. Up next is the removal of things I don’t need and to begin my hobby farm adventure with the least amount of stuff possible. Continue to follow for more on my minimalist adventure.