Gypsy

Someone referred to me as a gypsy.

I move a lot. Since college I have lived in 7 places (not different houses, different cities) in 12 years.

Every time I move it’s to follow my bliss and pursue happiness. At least that’s how I want to look at it today. During a few of those moves it felt more like running like hell. But, I now have the blessing of retrospect.

Right after college I sold everything I owned and moved to Lithuania to teach English. Obviously, I had to move to return to the United States.

My first real job was in a Utah town as a reporter and it was fantastic. Except, it was in Utah. The dating pool consists of Mormon or Freak. I went through an entire year when I was 24 when my only dates turned out to be secretly married. I’ve got to get the hell out of here to have a normal dating life, I decided.

I got a great job in a fishing village in Central California. Then all at once – in the matter of a week or two - my boyfriend turned into a psycho and inexplicably dumped me (Thank You God, because it turns out he too was secretly married, cheating on me, and a sociopathic pedophile), my job payed me so little I was barely surviving, my landlady dropped dead and her son raised my rent $200. I figured the universe was telling me: move on. So I sold everything again and got the hell out of there. 

Transition East Texas visiting Grandmother, met guy who hitched a ride to New York where I could pursue my writing career. Married guy, had baby, quit job. You know that expression: New York, if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere? Turns out, we couldn’t. Not on a single income in the most expensive city in the world.

We made an emergency, Maybe we can save ourselves by moving to New Jersey move. I sat there in this suburban apartment complex and realized if I was going to be broke and living Not My Dream, I may as well do it around relatives who could provide free babysitting like NaNa and PaPa. Sold everything, moved.

Back to East Texas. The town we were living in was getting on my nerves. It had been 4 years after all. Not to mention we couldn’t afford our dream home if we stayed there. A dream home is worth moving for. This time, I didn’t sell everything because we didn’t have much . Which might explain why packing seemed like such an insurmountable task.

This town is small and quaint and I can be happy here. For about 3 years. Zack will be off to school. My husband will be ready to make a professional move. We’ll have a big fat emergency fund saved and we’ll be ready to take on another big city. Who knows, I may want to go back to an office.

Different phases of life have different definitions of bliss. If you have to move to find it. Move!

That military-brat thing got in my blood, I guess I am a bit of a gypsy.