The Next Big Move
So, here's the deal. One of my good Birmingham friends told me the other day that she's got kind of the itch to move. She's been in town a few years, moved up for a relationship that ultimately ended, feels like the city isn't home anymore if it ever was. Basically, it's getting to be about that time. I guess the problem then for me is that, if she goes, I feel like I'll lose social circle critical mass. I've only got two or three actual good friends here in town, and if one of them goes, that's a whole wing of friendly acquaintances and guys you talk to at parties gone too, which I guess isn't a huge loss in and of itself, but at the same time, all those ancillary friends and friends of friends are, in many ways, what makes a place go from just somewhere you're staying to somewhere you really live, somewhere that is, if only for a time, home. They're the people you run into at the bookstore or who turn you on to a show that's coming to town. Like roots, they make you feel connected to a place by tying you in to the real life of it on a daily basis. Otherwise, you're just a dude working a job, renting an apartment waiting for something else to come along.
And of course your actual friends are important too.
Anyway, it got me to thinking that my days in Birmingham might be numbered. It's my own damn fault, really. I took a job with a year or two lifespan already in mind, and as such didn't think nearly hard enough about whether or not I'd actually enjoy doing it. If it was gonna be temporary, said past me, then why give a shit? Turns out a year is a long-ass time to do work you don't enjoy. Who knew? Now, I don't know whether or not I'll find another job in town that I would want to stay at for any length of time. I hate to be thinking about bailing after not even a year, especially since it seems like there's a lot left to get to know about the city, but I know I'm not up for staying at my company for more than a year (and even that out of a vague sense of duty and a desire to not look like a flake), and once that's gone and especially if my friend leaves, I don't know that there's enough here to make me want to take any special effort to stick around.
A move seems probable or at least plausible. But where to? I'm somewhat of two minds on the subject. On one hand, part of me wants to go live, as I've been calling it, "somewhere crazy," which is to say New York or Chicago or something like that. Some great city of the world I could go to and start anew, building a fabulous new life for myself amongst all the interesting people I'd surely meet there in short order. Fresh starts, new beginnings, that's what I need, dammit. Past is prologue, and it's time to get out there, shed some of it, and really start living.
However, there is the slight matter of the fact that I actually like my friends, my family, my life. Maybe not always, but I certainly don't need a freaking clean slate. It's not like my existence is some shit hole that I need to make a clean break from if I'm ever to have a real shot. Granted, it may seem that way when it's Sunday night, and all I have to keep me company is a rerun of The Simpsons and the creeping knowledge that my celibate streak is winding its way towards it's second year, but that's just whiny bullshit, and while it's all perfectly well and good to bore my Livejournal friends with that crap, it isn't something one bases a major life decision on. Unless one does, which I might. I'm thick like that.
Basically, think of places that I've lived or places where I know people as emotional gravity wells, locations that I am intrinsically drawn to by forces unseen. The question is then "Is that attraction a good thing or bad thing?" To what am I being pulled?
Regardless, the status quo is on thin ice already, and after six years at Georgia Tech, I no longer feel the need to stay at something just to prove I won't let it beat me. So something's coming. The only question is what.
And of course your actual friends are important too.
Anyway, it got me to thinking that my days in Birmingham might be numbered. It's my own damn fault, really. I took a job with a year or two lifespan already in mind, and as such didn't think nearly hard enough about whether or not I'd actually enjoy doing it. If it was gonna be temporary, said past me, then why give a shit? Turns out a year is a long-ass time to do work you don't enjoy. Who knew? Now, I don't know whether or not I'll find another job in town that I would want to stay at for any length of time. I hate to be thinking about bailing after not even a year, especially since it seems like there's a lot left to get to know about the city, but I know I'm not up for staying at my company for more than a year (and even that out of a vague sense of duty and a desire to not look like a flake), and once that's gone and especially if my friend leaves, I don't know that there's enough here to make me want to take any special effort to stick around.
A move seems probable or at least plausible. But where to? I'm somewhat of two minds on the subject. On one hand, part of me wants to go live, as I've been calling it, "somewhere crazy," which is to say New York or Chicago or something like that. Some great city of the world I could go to and start anew, building a fabulous new life for myself amongst all the interesting people I'd surely meet there in short order. Fresh starts, new beginnings, that's what I need, dammit. Past is prologue, and it's time to get out there, shed some of it, and really start living.
However, there is the slight matter of the fact that I actually like my friends, my family, my life. Maybe not always, but I certainly don't need a freaking clean slate. It's not like my existence is some shit hole that I need to make a clean break from if I'm ever to have a real shot. Granted, it may seem that way when it's Sunday night, and all I have to keep me company is a rerun of The Simpsons and the creeping knowledge that my celibate streak is winding its way towards it's second year, but that's just whiny bullshit, and while it's all perfectly well and good to bore my Livejournal friends with that crap, it isn't something one bases a major life decision on. Unless one does, which I might. I'm thick like that.
Basically, think of places that I've lived or places where I know people as emotional gravity wells, locations that I am intrinsically drawn to by forces unseen. The question is then "Is that attraction a good thing or bad thing?" To what am I being pulled?
Regardless, the status quo is on thin ice already, and after six years at Georgia Tech, I no longer feel the need to stay at something just to prove I won't let it beat me. So something's coming. The only question is what.