Living with our unaccompanied baggage (UAB) is the ultimate minimalist military family experience. Okay, it’s not by choice, but you have to agree, it does make you temporarily feel like a minimalist. Every time I live on roughly 1000 lbs of our household items, these thoughts cross my mind without fail.
I am fine living with our unaccompanied baggage
In fact, I almost dread the arrival of the rest of my household goods. Sure, it would be nice to have real furniture. But I have learned that over time, we have become pretty efficient at identifying our essentials and maximizing the use of our allowed weight to get the most out of our UAB.
I wonder why I own crates full of extra things that I have not needed in the last few months…
When you have lived on your unaccompanied baggage for a couple of months, most of your household goods no longer feel that essential. It actually inspires me to make mental notes of things I should consider getting rid of. I make a conscious effort to declutter and purge before packing out, but I also take inventory on the receiving end – especially after having lived without these items for a while… and often being fine with it.
It is so much easier to clean the house when we are living with our unaccompanied baggage
This one is a no brainer. And I remind myself of this every time I am tackling a declutter mini-project in my house. In fact, I try to teach this idea to my kids whenever I get the chance. The less you own, the less you have to clean. Who doesn’t want that?
I miss my couch when I am living with our unaccompanied baggage
If I am being totally honest – I still miss my couch every time we’re living the minimalist military family life. I miss having a nice, comfortable place to sit to watch tv or read. Since you can’t ship furniture with your UAB, I have not found a work around on this one (besides the occasional access to government furniture). Any brilliant suggestions, welcome!
I can sleep on futons, no problem
Speaking of not being able to pack furniture in your UAB… the one thing I have managed to include in our UAB is our foldable memory foam futons. Are they allowed? I have no idea. But I have managed to talk my way into including them with our unaccompanied baggage, 3 times.
Maybe I’m a little biased here since I grew up sleeping on futons in Japan. For us, it was a matter of necessity since we slept in the living room and put our futons up during the day so we can use that same space for eating/hanging out. The efficiency part of that still makes me happy in a nerdy way.
I despise air mattresses
Once upon a time, when I was a super young military spouse, I was fine with air mattresses. But somewhere around PCS #6, I refused to share an air mattress with my husband after being bounced around when he would toss and turn in the middle of the night. No, thank you. I bought a couple of foldable futons and they have been so much easier to sleep on. The kids still get air mattresses – they don’t seem to mind them.
I love having more open space in the house
I feel lighter (mentally and emotionally), when I have less things around me. When I see empty spaces now, I no longer have the need to fill it with something. I see the empty space almost like a mental break and sometimes, I just enjoy… having less.
I kind of like the echoing sound in my semi-empty home
In a weird way, I actually like the echoing sound inside a semi-empty house. I don’t know if it’s because it signals a time of transition for us. I think I have come to associate the sound of a semi-empty house and living with our unaccompanied baggage with new adventures. As stressful and emotional as PCS can be, I still find the possibilities of a new place exciting.
