journal features

the stress of moving

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Toronto, 2003.06.03

I have this coworker named Juriy (that's Yuri to English speakers). He's from Ukraine. I told him that I had, until recently, been concerned about my oddly wobbly health of late. But I'd decided it was from the stress of moving and starting a new job at the same time.

He told me that in Ukraine, there's an expression that goes, "A move is worth two fires."

I asked him, "Do you have a lot of house fires in Ukraine?" He told me no, that it was designed to highlight the stress of moving. I nodded wisely, understanding at last. Clever Ukrainians.

This is my 14th home. I hope I can stay put for a change.

Note from 2023: I wouldn't stay put, and I wouldn't keep the job for that matter.

rand()m quote

Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something. The ingredients are there. You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be a life that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success or failure is of less account.

—John Gardner