genesis

I decided to go around the world because nothing else was working out. Despite my pretty compelling laziness, I have always been a fairly driven person, and was consequently convinced (at least in my head) that I was going to Be Something someday. I worked towards it, followed all the right things, said no to drugs, stayed in school, etc.

I got jobs, and got better jobs, and moved onwards and upwards. Until I was living in a city I did not like (what up, LA!), doing a job that I had grown beyond, and looking for a change. One protracted, disheartening and fruitless job search later, and our hero is well and truly depressed. The problem was the realization not that I was not going to get one of these jobs I was vying for, but that I didn't really...want them. The actual jobs and the actual industry were so far removed from what I was passionate about and what I wanted to do that even if I had what I was supposed to be working for, I still wouldn't be happy.

So, okay, so time to regroup and figure out what it is, instead, that is going to make me happy, since it will no longer be this path to this career, clearly. I put in notice at my apartment, and start to bandy about wild notions -- I should move to a small town and open a movie theatre; I should become a pastry chef; I should find a sugar daddy (still considering that last one, too). I should chuck it all and go around the world.

That one stuck.

When I was in college and therabouts, I was huge on travel. During those four years, I went to London enough that I actually got BORED WITH IT. Can you imagine? But one thing I always coveted about British culture was the respect for taking off. It was in London, and all of the zillions of travel agents that are everywhere, that I noticed the "Around the World" fare that was at the end of every single deal board out front. That was when I got the pipe dream of taking off for a year and just heading all around, going to every single place that I want to see. It was one of the things that I knew I was never going to do, because I had this spectacular career path all figured out in my head, and that made me sad, but it was just the way it is.

And then, suddenly, career out, travel in. So I quit my job and moved home with my parents(glamorous!). I got another job, one that also brought me back to academia a bit, which I had missed, that actually paid more. And I started to save.

The idea was, if I am going to try to figure out where I want to be, I can do it miserable and aimless in a place, both literal and figurative, that I hate, or I can do it on my own on Thai beaches and Chilean glaciers and Croatian cities. I clearly lost a bit of the original dream when it came down to it -- I could go round the world three times, and just keep coming up with places I wanted to see, and I am not going for a full year, and I am doing it on the cheap -- but the essence is the same: look out world.

So that is why I am doing this -- nothing else worked out, so I am doing something for me. Something that I know I cannot regret. Something that I never thought I would be able to do.