All I Want...
From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.
We carry within us
the wonders we seek
without us.
--Thomas Brown
So too, we; for don't our bubbles of pain get trapped in our feathers, turning to jewls the closer we get to the current under everything…? …In truth, the more we accept our limitations and surrender to the depths below our woundedness, the more the vastness holds up. There is no way to know this but to dive.
I do not think I have ever been so torn about making a decision. I know it is a decision that only I can make - ultimately and in the end - because I have to be an adult for once in my life… but I have to be a loving one, and this decision doesn't just affect me. I have been offered the job at the school in Cairo, and now I must decide whether to take it.
Mir and I talked yesterday, at length, and on and off as often as we could, trying to figure through the pros and cons - if, in theory, I got the job.
There's the money, financially it's better for us, it's regular income, and right now, here, there's just hardly any work. We both need for me to be pulling my weight financially, I feel like a terrible person at the moment, because I'm not, I have no regular income, work is all very hit and miss, and that means that I can't help with rent, with groceries, with anything that I should be - without a job I can't help with the things we want to do. Without enough work it might end up meaning I couldn't be there for Christmas.
There's the 'networking' possibilities… the connections that could be made that could get me to where I want to be - with Mir in NC. There's the fact that the experience enhances my professional resume, which also makes me a more attractive proposition to future employers - especially international ones - especially in private school, and those are the type of schools that would sponsor the visa to the US. And though we both, independently, and together came to the same conclusion yesterday - that it would be stupid not to take the position… it's until the end of the school year, it doesn't change one. Big. Fact.
I'd be there without her. Neither of us wants that.
But at the same time, neither of us wants to be stuck apart because we can't afford for me to travel… and neither of us the other to feel the pressure or stress of scraping pennies, or not being able to do the things we want… and neither of us wants to be selfish. Mir gave me the hugest gift, the most loving gift she could yesterday in saying that she wasn't going to be selfish and tell me not to go. I can't express how loving that was, and how brave and unselfish and everything, because I know that she, like me, had always said that we'd be there together and emotionally, that's huge, and it would mean a few changes until I got back. Essentially not many, really, and not big ones… As Mir said, on the days that I can stay up, I'll still stay up, the time difference, we'll work around. We do anyway now, so it's not much difference. It's only until June… it would give me the chance to be there with her on 4th July for the first time ever - something we've often wished. And it would give me longer to be able to be there and help get everything straight in the house without being a financial burden… and I was a burden this last summer.
I think there was a very childish part of me that was hoping through the day to get home and find that the head teacher had decided to go with one of the other candidates. Or that the offer he would come back with would not be as good as it was made out to be, (it was as good, if not better); take away the responsibility of making the decision, but life's not like that, and that would be terribly selfish anyway, at a time when all I want to be is /un/selfish.
It perhaps wouldn't be so bad, so hard of a decision, if it wasn't all happening so quickly… I'd have time to get used to the idea, we both would - to figure out strategies for things, to sort out cell phones and communications - though I know those are things I'd have to sort out over there or end up paying way too much for, to give TP the chance to get their payroll sorted out too, so I'm not worrying about that as well, but the role is to replace a teacher that's been taken out of class, and they need someone in there quickly to give the children stability. But then again, maybe if there was a longer time it would be worse because we'd be agonising about it more than I already am. I just don't know.
There's a big part of me that wants to cry out, 'No, I won't go without you, I know you don't want me to. I love you too much to do that. We'll get by somehow.' But would that be the loving thing to do, really - when she's said she wouldn't be selfish and tell me not to. Wouldn't that hurt her by making her feel guilty? How does that respect her?
There's another big part of me that knows that for all the reasons we both decided yesterday, it would be a foolish thing to turn down the opportunity, because of all the good it could bring. A part that says, 'We need me to do this. I love you, and I want to contribute to this relationship, and I haven't been. I need to help with our finances, I need to also save for the things we want to do. I want to be able to bring you here to visit me, and know where to go with you. I need to come back with you and do all of the things we said we would do at home.' Isn't that doing all that I've said I would, and by that 'doing' not just 'saying' that I love her? In that way too, caring for both of our emotional needs as well as the financial and the practical…?
And in between those two parts, there's the big part that needs her, that needs to be able to turn on the computer and Skype and be able to talk with her, share with her, hear her talking… I wonder if she knows how much the sound of her voice is a comfort to me… I'm sure she does, I listen to it often enough - too much. The part of me that needs her to be 'my guy' the one I can turn to, the one in whose arms I can shelter… the one I trust. I need her right now more than ever.
There was a period of time where we coped with the distance between us, when we coped with the going away from NC after the school holidays by saying that I was just 'going away to work,' now here we are… and that's exactly what this would be doing, if I take the job.
Worries for myself, about being somewhere foreign that I don't know are really a non-consideration, because the school looks after the staff so well, transport, accommodation and everything, and I'm not the kind of going out and living it up kind of person. That's not to say I wouldn't experience anything just… that the worries aren't there as they could have been. Family first; love first, that's the way I've always tried to look at things, but here, what's necessary and what's good for us and what we both want are all so mixed in together, it's harder to say what that 'best' is, even if we did already decide - in theory - yesterday… and not because of anyone but my own conflicts. As I said in yesterday's post, the first thing I thought when it came up, was, I don't want to be there without Mir… but I also don't want either of us feeling guilty or feeling regret at the end of the day… whatever the decision ends up being.
We carry within us
the wonders we seek
without us.
--Thomas Brown
So too, we; for don't our bubbles of pain get trapped in our feathers, turning to jewls the closer we get to the current under everything…? …In truth, the more we accept our limitations and surrender to the depths below our woundedness, the more the vastness holds up. There is no way to know this but to dive.
I do not think I have ever been so torn about making a decision. I know it is a decision that only I can make - ultimately and in the end - because I have to be an adult for once in my life… but I have to be a loving one, and this decision doesn't just affect me. I have been offered the job at the school in Cairo, and now I must decide whether to take it.
Mir and I talked yesterday, at length, and on and off as often as we could, trying to figure through the pros and cons - if, in theory, I got the job.
There's the money, financially it's better for us, it's regular income, and right now, here, there's just hardly any work. We both need for me to be pulling my weight financially, I feel like a terrible person at the moment, because I'm not, I have no regular income, work is all very hit and miss, and that means that I can't help with rent, with groceries, with anything that I should be - without a job I can't help with the things we want to do. Without enough work it might end up meaning I couldn't be there for Christmas.
There's the 'networking' possibilities… the connections that could be made that could get me to where I want to be - with Mir in NC. There's the fact that the experience enhances my professional resume, which also makes me a more attractive proposition to future employers - especially international ones - especially in private school, and those are the type of schools that would sponsor the visa to the US. And though we both, independently, and together came to the same conclusion yesterday - that it would be stupid not to take the position… it's until the end of the school year, it doesn't change one. Big. Fact.
I'd be there without her. Neither of us wants that.
But at the same time, neither of us wants to be stuck apart because we can't afford for me to travel… and neither of us the other to feel the pressure or stress of scraping pennies, or not being able to do the things we want… and neither of us wants to be selfish. Mir gave me the hugest gift, the most loving gift she could yesterday in saying that she wasn't going to be selfish and tell me not to go. I can't express how loving that was, and how brave and unselfish and everything, because I know that she, like me, had always said that we'd be there together and emotionally, that's huge, and it would mean a few changes until I got back. Essentially not many, really, and not big ones… As Mir said, on the days that I can stay up, I'll still stay up, the time difference, we'll work around. We do anyway now, so it's not much difference. It's only until June… it would give me the chance to be there with her on 4th July for the first time ever - something we've often wished. And it would give me longer to be able to be there and help get everything straight in the house without being a financial burden… and I was a burden this last summer.
I think there was a very childish part of me that was hoping through the day to get home and find that the head teacher had decided to go with one of the other candidates. Or that the offer he would come back with would not be as good as it was made out to be, (it was as good, if not better); take away the responsibility of making the decision, but life's not like that, and that would be terribly selfish anyway, at a time when all I want to be is /un/selfish.
It perhaps wouldn't be so bad, so hard of a decision, if it wasn't all happening so quickly… I'd have time to get used to the idea, we both would - to figure out strategies for things, to sort out cell phones and communications - though I know those are things I'd have to sort out over there or end up paying way too much for, to give TP the chance to get their payroll sorted out too, so I'm not worrying about that as well, but the role is to replace a teacher that's been taken out of class, and they need someone in there quickly to give the children stability. But then again, maybe if there was a longer time it would be worse because we'd be agonising about it more than I already am. I just don't know.
There's a big part of me that wants to cry out, 'No, I won't go without you, I know you don't want me to. I love you too much to do that. We'll get by somehow.' But would that be the loving thing to do, really - when she's said she wouldn't be selfish and tell me not to. Wouldn't that hurt her by making her feel guilty? How does that respect her?
There's another big part of me that knows that for all the reasons we both decided yesterday, it would be a foolish thing to turn down the opportunity, because of all the good it could bring. A part that says, 'We need me to do this. I love you, and I want to contribute to this relationship, and I haven't been. I need to help with our finances, I need to also save for the things we want to do. I want to be able to bring you here to visit me, and know where to go with you. I need to come back with you and do all of the things we said we would do at home.' Isn't that doing all that I've said I would, and by that 'doing' not just 'saying' that I love her? In that way too, caring for both of our emotional needs as well as the financial and the practical…?
And in between those two parts, there's the big part that needs her, that needs to be able to turn on the computer and Skype and be able to talk with her, share with her, hear her talking… I wonder if she knows how much the sound of her voice is a comfort to me… I'm sure she does, I listen to it often enough - too much. The part of me that needs her to be 'my guy' the one I can turn to, the one in whose arms I can shelter… the one I trust. I need her right now more than ever.
There was a period of time where we coped with the distance between us, when we coped with the going away from NC after the school holidays by saying that I was just 'going away to work,' now here we are… and that's exactly what this would be doing, if I take the job.
Worries for myself, about being somewhere foreign that I don't know are really a non-consideration, because the school looks after the staff so well, transport, accommodation and everything, and I'm not the kind of going out and living it up kind of person. That's not to say I wouldn't experience anything just… that the worries aren't there as they could have been. Family first; love first, that's the way I've always tried to look at things, but here, what's necessary and what's good for us and what we both want are all so mixed in together, it's harder to say what that 'best' is, even if we did already decide - in theory - yesterday… and not because of anyone but my own conflicts. As I said in yesterday's post, the first thing I thought when it came up, was, I don't want to be there without Mir… but I also don't want either of us feeling guilty or feeling regret at the end of the day… whatever the decision ends up being.