Two Suitcases and a Pocketful of Sunshine

I left Atlanta with two 70-pound suitcases and the key to a locker-sized storage unit filled to the brim with photographs, winter clothes and wine glasses I couldn't bare to part with.

Besides that, I owned nothing. No car, no furniture, no dog. Only a plane ticket to a tropical island on the other side of the world and a key to my own destiny.

For the past few months, I had systematically sold everything I owned. The dresser my grandmother gave me when I got my first unfurnished apartment in college, the baker's rack I had somehow squeezed into my old Saturn and the first car I had actually made payments on.

All of it was secondhand and not worth much to most, but to me, it was a symbol of the life I had built for myself. I could see my independence in that old, beat-up dresser and the comfort of myself in that squeaky mattress.

All of it was hard to part with, in a way. Even though I knew it would be all worth it one day, when I'm laying on the couch watching re-runs of Law & Order with the man I love.

That made it a bit easier. That, and how everyone who bought my stuff on Craigslist seemed to genuinely be excited. Everyone said whatever it was happened to be "just what I was looking for."

There was Bertrand, the French college student who said the 5-shelf corner unit I bought from Wal-Mart so many years ago said was just what he needed. There was Joanne, the Southern belle who was "tickled pink" she had found a baker's rack for her kitchen. And Scott, who needed my end table to furnish he and his wife's first apartment. "Thanks," I remember him saying. "We don't even have anything to sit our coffee cups on in the morning."

I feel blessed to have been a part of those people's lives, even if it was slight. The fact that everyone -- even the 300-pound guy who drove a Miata and bought my old boxing gloves -- actually needed the small things I had to give, made the journey worthwhile.

Now that I am here, looking at the beautiful blue water crashing on the coast outside my bedroom window, it all seems so far away.

I hope my old Corolla isn't giving Jeffrey any problems in that cold weather.