Moving house: backbreaking work

March 21, 2017 by Ray Morgan

My back went in Wickes on Saturday. I know.

My partner and I have just bought our first home, which has been one of the most stressful, infuriating, amazing, liberating and weirdly archaic experiences of our lives. People said it was going to be stressful, and I thought "Yeah but we can handle it!" with the kind of annoying naivety that people have when they've not bought a property before. It's really bloody hard isn't it?

In real terms, we were lucky because it was 4 months from putting in the offer to completion. But Christmas was wedged in between and there were 2 whole weeks where NOTHING happened. I soon became that annoying person who called the estate agent every day, and the solicitor, and the (incredible, badass, not-afraid-to-pick-up-the-phone-and-hassle-people) broker. I'm sure they saw my name flash up and their hearts sank, but hey, we wanted that place and we were going to get it.

It's emotional and physical stress, buying and moving. There was a moment on the night we got the keys where we sat in our rented flat among all our boxes and I had a big cry about how much I'd loved living there. 5 years of our lives had been spent there, through amazing times and difficult times. I suddenly felt desperately sad that we were just ditching it and moving on. Poor flat!

However, when the removal van pulled up outside the next morning, and all our stuff started disappearing down the stairs, in the cold light of day our flat stopped looking like our home, and became a shell. It was all our lovely things that made it a home.

The removal men - Lawes Brothers, who are amazing - gave seriously good banter, arrived at 9am and by 11.30am we were in our new home, in gorgeous Spring sunshine, staring at the WORLD of boxes in every room.

So this has been my life for the past 2 weeks - staring at boxes and lugging them from room to room, trying to find space for them. We downsized, because we'd managed to rent a big 2 bedroom flat and have bought a one bed because, as you all know, Leigh is INSANE on the old house price front. And I think we underestimated how physical the move would be.

It's easy to think that you're saving that stress by getting removal guys in - and it massively helps - but what comes after is unpacking, lifting, sorting, tidying, putting up pictures and then changing your mind about them. And there's also the evenings, after work when you're tired and ratty, crouched over flat pack, an argument brimming between you as you can't find the teeny tiny packet of '7H' screws - there's not enough light from your energy saving bulbs and you can't properly see, but you're halfway through the chest of drawers and all its 50 flippin' parts, and it's 9pm so you might as well carry on, bent over thinking "this can't be good for my back..."

So that's probably why my back went in Wickes. I had to get my lovely Dad to bend down and pick up shelf brackets for me, and eased myself into the car with the grace of an 95 year old, scrabbling in my bag for the Paramol.

But you know what, despite all that, it's amazing. Our walls are covered in tester pot squares, ready to put our stamp on the place. Furniture is arriving every week, lovely things for us to put all our toot on, in and around. We have a garden, and a shed! Wahey! It's full of stuff already, and I love it. I cooked a breakfast on Sunday when we were mildly hungover, and I had BBC 6Music on in the kitchen with the window open, nudging a breeze onto my face. Our last flat had no kitchen windows. Possibly illegal, HIGHLY annoying. But here I can open the window and hear birds while I make hash browns from scratch. And in the garden, our camellia is coming into flower. The swathe of buds hid the colour from us but now we can see there's going to be an explosion of pale pink blooms and guess what? It's ours. All of it. It's worth the back pain. Just have to make sure I always have codeine in stock, and do some morning yoga...