Persistent Teacup

There are only so many times you can face the truth and not be changed.

That’s what I text-messaged to myself on Sunday. I realized that I can’t hold on to things that are only whiffs in the air. If you hadn’t guessed, when I referred to falling in love in that survey I did about 2006, I was talking about Noah. No big surprise there. But the thing is, I know the truth. We have talked generally about marriage before. I actually want to get married (quite a contrast to the opinion I’ve held most of my life). Noah is very unsure about it. And I can’t force him to want something he doesn’t. I’ve tried to ignore this fact for many months. I’ve tried to bury it or look for evidence to the contrary. But.

But.

There are only so many times you can face the truth and not be changed.

And that is the painful reality I’m faced with now. When I take a good, honest look at my life, I know that there are a lot of things I am holding onto because of Noah. We work together and do a lot of things together, and I don’t want to give that up. But I can’t keep my life the way it is holding out for a hope that I doubt will come true.

As the months roll by in this new year, I am faced with several uncomfortable truths. I am going to be 25 in a few months. I have been at The Restaurant for 2 years in April. I promised myself when I was hired that I wouldn’t be there longer than a year. I didn’t want to be a lifer in serving. I was considering all this last year as my first anniversary came up, but then Jessica died and my life kind of went into survival mode. Drastic changes to my life just weren’t possible last year. But this year, I am more healed. I graduated from college almost 3 years ago, and I haven’t really done anything with my degree. I’m going to be 25 soon, and I don’t feel like I’m in an appropriate place in my life anymore for my age and accomplishments. A part of me feels like I’ve been taking it too easy. Most of all, I don’t want to be a server when I turn 26. And if I want to prevent that from happening, I have to take steps this year to change that.

So I’m facing these truths in my life and beginning to ponder how this all spells out specifically in my life. It means finding a new job, it means letting go of some of my dreams, it means drastically changing the direction of my life.

Step 1: I started looking for a new job this past week. Scary. Because for me, this most likely means moving. I just feel like where I’m going isn’t here. That I have to look beyond the comfortable surroundings and people I’ve known and stretch myself. I found a job posting that sounded interesting, and so I emailed them my cover letter and resume today. It’s in Arizona. I’m purposely not looking in California. I kind of want to leave. There are some things about my life that will always be that way if I live here, close to my family. And some of those things I want changed, and that means moving away. In some ways, that makes me sad, but that’s just the way it is. I’m kind of excited about the job I applied for, but I’m trying not to get my hopes up. I’ve applied for several jobs in the last 3 years, and obviously not gotten any of them. So I won’t hold my breath on this one.

Then we’ll see what Step 2 is.

P.S. That little counting thing in the lefthand column is how many days I’ve been alive. I put it up because I want to remember how far I’ve come and how much closer I am.