PBO, packed by owner

I happened to be around when my sister and her family moved apartments last weekend in downtown Chicago. She successfully crowded three lives into two big moving trucks and had them transported 20 plus miles down the road to a location closer to her place of work. I photographed as the the movers shlepped the furniture and PBO (packed by owner) boxes into the new, more compact, space. The stories behind the contents in each box are infinite, which is why they are still claimed, crated, hauled and again put on display. This struck me as I thought of my many changes as I work to settle satisfactorily. 

I've been in Chicago for two weeks now. Before that I was living on a sailboat in Key West, FL. And before that I was in Salt Lake City, UT. Somewhere in between, and spanning anywhere from months to years, I've lived in Terre Haute, Ind., Athens, OH and Andros Island, Bahamas. With each move came the elimination of more stuff. These days I choose to travel with things I use routinely; my camera gear, my boots, and so on. The irony is that even when you put down your own baggage, there is someone else's to carry. In this instance, it's my father's.   

While looking to freelance as a photojournalist in the city, I'm restoring my father's apartment buildings. But getting to the actual bones of each room is the first trick. I have to unearth a century's worth of belongings first; be it his or his father's or his past tenants. What appears to have happened is that the hunt for specific items was cut short with every passing decade. Instead of finding what was lost, a new item was either purchased or scavenged and put in its place. The other day I thought of the one and only spoon I owned while living in Utah as I counted 44 of my father's snow shovels. And as soon as I find 44 shovelers, I can lay soundly in my bed knowing I'm prepared for winter.