When I was a kid, we had several videotapes of different seasons of Monty Python, the great British comedy show. Monty Python is truly the best of British skit comedy, and in between skits they always had funny little animated non-sequiturs, or seconds-long pronouncements to transition. Their most iconic is “And now for something completely different!” Announced between two unrelated sketches, it became a catchphrase forever reminiscent of those great British comedians.
I’ve entered a season of my life that one could compassionately call a “growth spurt,” or perhaps “growing pains,” but would more realistically be “insufferable about any and everything because she’s horribly unhappy with all aspects of her current situation and never stops complaining about it,” phase. It’s tough. My husband and I are in the same boat, and thankfully on the same page about what needs to change (state, city, home, job, life goals, you name it) and we have begun to take steps to make that change a reality. However, this change is big. It’s going to take time. It’s a process that is frustratingly, infuriatingly slow and will inevitably cause me no small measure of emotional distress when it actually takes place. But I’ve weighed the pros and cons, and even though we want this change desperately, we also don't really have a choice. It needs to happen, and we need to make it happen.
My life right now feels like a size eight foot in a size five shoe. I’m too big for my britches, as Grandma would say. I’m ready for something completely, wildly, frighteningly different. For the longest time, I believed that I knew what I wanted, where I wanted to live, what I wanted to do and who I wanted to be within those spheres. I was wrong. Don’t get me wrong— I love the things my husband and I have done, and what we have accomplished for ourselves. We couldn’t realistically have accomplished them any other way. But in the last two months, something clunked over inside my rusty “think-outside-the-box” mechanism, and I was suddenly unable to continue to be satisfied, or even happy, with remaining where we are. It’s time for something completely different.
And now I wait. I wait while the maddeningly long days and months pass, while at the same time dreading just a bit what the (inevitably too soon) moment of departure will bring when I leave my home town, my home state, my beloved family, behind. And I wrestle with irrational anger that I— a Bay Area native of five generations, a California native— cannot afford a home here, or the life that my husband and I really want. That our dollar goes nowhere, yet hordes of humans from far and wide flock here to live comfortably and richly and well. I resent them. I tell myself that surely I am more deserving of this land than they.
And maybe that’s true, and maybe it isn’t. But either way, moping about “deserving,” or making myself angry about other people’s achievements doesn’t change my situation. Only action and dedication will. So I begin this journey with a new blog, sharing what will hopefully be new perspectives, lessons, and insights I glean from chasing what I never believed was a possibility for me. I’m really excited about it. I’m full of hope. It’s time for me to hurry up and wait, and I hope you’ll join me at the very beginning of this new adventure, a completely different decision for a completely different life.