Right… deep breath. We are leaving Scotland.

Not right now obviously (although I wish it was) but it is one of those things that I don’t think I’ll believe until my butt is on the airplane so I am saying it as much as I can in hopes that my brain finally clicks on. We are still a while out but this isn’t one of those things that we can just jump straight into without prep otherwise we’ll end up in a sticky situation.

Leaving home. Which sounds straightforward until you’re actually doing it and realise it involves a suspicious number of lists and highlighter pens, a concerning number of decisions, a big choice in what hoody’s and shoes should be packed, at least one existential wobble, and a deep, irrational fear that you’ve forgotten how passports and airports work despite having used them multiple times before.

This is not a calm, minimal, Pinterest perfect guide to travel preparation, or even any guide at all! This is the real pre-travel phase: slightly (majorly) frantic but attempting to be organised, overly sentimental, fortnightly burn out, and fuelled by half-packed bags ready for donation and too many cans of energy drink. The one where you start thinking about flights and end up sitting on the floor staring at a pair of socks wondering who you even are. Thankfully we already home educate so there will be no need to deal with schools and we can continue with the education plan and schedule that already works for W.

So this is us, mid-decluttering, mid-spiral, mid-excitement, documenting everything we’re doing before leaving Scotland; not in neat bullet points or aesthetically influencer in anyway (because that isn’t us), but as it actually unfolds.

First comes the illusion of simplicity. It always begins with the things that are supposed to be easy. Passports. Documents. Travel insurance. Easy. We are adults. We have folders and lists. We know stuff and things. I have spreadsheets and a big green ringbinder.

And then suddenly we’re checking passport expiry dates for the third time in one day (and not just because I have the memory of a sieve), convinced that time might have accelerated. Passports are placed in a Very Specific Bag that has its own safe place (a proper one, not one that you forget about in 3 months time). This bag has achieved sacred status. I would forget books before I forgot it.

There’s a strange comfort in this stage as it feels quite official but also a sort of limbo. Once the documents are sorted and stuff actually starts getting booked, the trip will become real in a way that can’t be undone by nerves or bad weather or last-minute panic-Googling. Leaving Scotland stops being an idea and starts becoming a fact. We are still yet to book our flights but it is inching ever closer and phones beep with notifications from apps tracking prices and so on even more often now.

The admin phase follows quickly after, and it is deeply unglamorous in a messy list of what to notify and when. Banks must be notified, because nothing kills the romance of travel quite like your card being frozen over a croissant and you scramble in your purse trying to work out a currency you aren’t used to. But it is not yet time to notify them. It is however, on the list. We are making sure we have backups of everything, because trusting a single card feels like tempting fate. This is also when subscriptions rise from the dead or make you reconsider if you actually need that or can you live with ads (we can – not on YouTube or Crunchyroll though). Cancelling unneeded subs feels oddly therapeutic, like shedding small, unnecessary versions of your past self.

Mail has a way of feeling more serious than it actually is and important letters become more important simply by existing. Everything actually important like birth and marriage certificates will get scanned and securely backed up in our own Fort Knox. Someone sensible will know how to reach us if an envelope or Howler arrives that looks like it could ruin our week.

We haven’t packed anything yet, it is still too early for that, but packing has already begun in spirit; as a psychological experiment we keep volunteering for.

We know how it goes, everything we own ends up on the bed to sort through, despite overwhelming evidence that this system does not work and has not worked in the past for holidays etc. There’s a brief, delusional moment where we believe we’ll pack light, that this time we’re different people and then this belief fades quickly as another dress or pair of shoes gets added in. We’re (ok, I’m the problem) going to try and pack light and be strict knowing that we need to cart it all around with us.. but, we’ll see.

Despite planning to leave Scotland and it’s four seasons in one day behind, we will unknowingly pack layers like we’re preparing for betrayal of forecast. Light ones, warm ones, comforting ones. Scotland teaches you that the weather is a liar, you just never know when a rain shower will hit sideways or a glimmer of sunshine and Vitamin D will appear that your peely wally skin yearns for, and that lesson follows you everywhere.

Toiletries haven’t been packed, but they have entered the group chat. We’ll start with a few weeks’ worth and trust that the rest can be found as we go, perhaps discovering new favourites. It’s a future-us problem. Toothbrushes sit firmly at the top of the mental list, thanks to a past experience we don’t need to repeat. Skincare, meanwhile, is being gently negotiated down to “the essentials”, a category that sounds simple until you start asking what actually helps you feel like yourself when everything else is unfamiliar.

Lately, we’ve started thinking about the practical things, again not packing them yet, just noticing them. Technology, for example is probably our biggest as we rely so much on it now. Chargers, adapters and plugs for the countries on our list, the quiet realisation that everything we rely on needs power somewhere, laptops and phones etc, the things that will still keep us connected to those we care about as well as for study and home education, or world travel once we leave. At some point, all of it will be tested and double-checked near the time, because discovering something doesn’t work in the wrong time zone is not the kind of adventure we’re chasing.

I will have a lot of uni material to take with me, thankfully some can be studied on a laptop but with the degree being English Literature and Creative Writing, well, there are a fair few books that will need to come along.

This is the phase where nothing is happening, but everything is being considered. We’re not cleaning out the fridge or turning off lights yet. We’re still very much here, but there’s a growing awareness that the routines we move through every day aren’t permanent.

Leaving Scotland, when it comes, won’t just be about travel logistics and planning A to B. It will be about stepping away from the ordinary rhythms that have quietly shaped our lives for the past 3 decades, the familiar streets, the default shops, the walks taken without thinking of where we are and how do we get back to ‘home’. Not losing them but just letting them become something we remember instead of something we repeat.

This year and the early months of next has been and will be, about how preparation doesn’t always need to look like action, sometimes it is about just paying attention and noticing what we’ll carry with us, what we’ll need to let go of, and what can stay right where it is until the moment comes. A proper check list will come in due time, when the bookings and flights are ticked off the current list and with excitement of “we’re actually doing this!” bubbling in our veins.

It starts like this, with thought and with the decision to look forward while staying put, reminding us that change doesn’t arrive all at once.