I am trying to get back into the habit. Not that I’ve ever really had a great habit about posting before. The gaps in my posting history are like the rails of a rotted fence. I am starting off by taking it slow, a quick post last week. Now, I’m taking a quick look in my Drafts Folder to see if there’s anything in there. In all honestly, I’m a little surprised by what I have hiding in there. A couple of short stories that would be something with a lot of work and a little luck. A bunch of aborted posts that are snippets in time; only a fraction of a moment held in suspended animation.

The oldest was from the beginning of the pandemic, just after everything was shut down. Such a strange time in our lives. Four humans and two dogs living in a two-bedroom townhouse, just figuring out how to co-exist in this new reality…

…how can time move this quickly and this slowly at the same time. I have been in lock down now for 90 days. And yes, it’s true Virginia, the days do start to run together. I am fortunate that my job is remote, even before the pandemic, so for me very little has changed. While at the same time everything has. My wife has had to close her business. My son is doing school in front of a Chromebook…

Well, her business never really reopened. And my son didn’t go back into a school in California. My job is still remote. And time, in fact, has continued to move both too quickly and too slowly at the same time. My personal lock down started February 20, 2020. The next day I had a medical procedure that left me sitting at home for a week. By the time I was headed back to an office we were told to just work from home…

…I know that our story is not unique. A couple of Millennial’s with weird jobs, no house, plenty of student debt, kids and a couple of small dogs. Literally millions of us, with over 72 million estimated members of that generation. We aren’t special in any real sense. We have lived through a couple of recessions and war in the Middle East for our entire adult lives. We have even acted as spoilers; a quick Google search for “Millennial’s ruined…” include the results America, Star Wars, mayonnaise, tattoos, dating, handshakes, music, and, finally, The World. I mean, we totally did, but mayonnaise had it coming.
We had long decided that staying in our current location would work for us. The average home price was far outside of our budget, by nearly 3 times. We were quickly priced out of living our true dream and moving to the Pacific Northwest. Then my company let me know they were moving the corporate office to Austin, Texas. And it might just be worth my while to join them.
We never really looked at Texas. There’s an entire host of reasons that we hadn’t considered the Southern states as a real option. For one, we don’t like humidity. Or fried food. Or racism. However, the…

At first, all was well. We arrived safely in July of 2021 and rented a place. Our house started construction shortly after we arrived. Our oldest started school in the Fall. But then we started to notice…things. Nothing major, just little things. We struggled to find our tribe; the people that you feel comfortable around, or that have matching interests and values. We didn’t feel like we belonged. We tried to join a few things, or meet people through the kids. For one reason or another, we just never found it. Then the kids started to struggle. Their particular struggles are not my story and I’ll leave that for their own blogs and books in the future. Leave it at they needed support and we needed help. That did not, and does not, exist in Texas…

…I moved to Texas just over 2 years ago; lured by a job and the prospect of owning a home. There have been so many moments that I’ve questioned the decisions that led us to this particular juncture of time and space. Plenty of times that I don’t feel like I belong, or that I left my tribe thousands of miles away. That my reasons for coming here were, even in the best of intentions, miss-placed. In the midst of a pandemic, with not enough space, not enough support, not enough money, this seemed like a great decision. Now, with a couple of years to mull it over…

We spent four years there. We had a house we loved and a few friends. We had lost the dogs; one to cancer and the other to an aging body that quit on him. We had two amazing kids that needed more support than the school system or the state would provide. We absolutely hated the weather. At the end of it, the reasons to go were more than the reasons to stay…

I am 4 days from turning 40.
I don’t really know how to feel about this fact. I don’t feel 40. I don’t know what 40 is supposed to feel like, but I don’t think I feel like that. How can I ever be expected to know what middle age feels like if I’m just starting to figure out who I am?
I am writing this outside of a coffee shop in Dallas. It would be a lovely early-Autumn day in California, but is, in reality, only a normally hot day for Texas. I found myself with a few moments to ponder the upcoming anniversary of another trip around the Sun.
In 40 years, I have made mistakes and had some great successes. I have loved and experienced amazing joy. I have been angry and scared and hopeful, sometimes all at the same time. I like to think that I’ve made a difference in people’s lives, even if it was a small one. I have accomplished some goals, and have fallen short on others. I’ve grown and changed, and I know that will continue to be true.
Who will I be in the next 40 years? I’d like to think that I will continue to grow, to find ways to improve myself and my world. I’d like to think I’ll continue to discover who I am. I would also like to think that there will still be a world to discover. In my 40 years, the only thing that I know doesn’t change, is that everything can change…

We had thought 2016 changed everything. It did. We thought 2020 was a year for the history books. It was. But 2024 beat them all. It broke something for all of us; individually, as a family, as a country, even a species. I don’t know what it was yet, I’ll leave that for some history professor in the future to figure out. That year though, my 41st “trip around the Sun,” I know now was a turning point for me personally.

We decided that Fall that we were going. We didn’t know how or where or when, but we knew that this was the end of our time. It took us another few months to get things figured out. We sold the house, said our goodbyes, and loaded up our lives. We headed for the Pacific Northwest to live our best imitation of The Dream.

I don’t know what the future holds. If the last decade has taught us anything it’s that none of us do. But until we hit publish, our lives are only a draft. We shouldn’t leave the best of us hidden in a folder, known only to ourselves. For too long I’ve allowed the best parts of myself to live as a draft. To keep it safely hidden away and protected from any critic. We have to take a leap and let those drafts see the light of day occasionally. To shine a spotlight on them, blemishes and all. To say, “This is me, and I exist.” Otherwise we have to question whether we really do at all.

Until next time, my friends, stay curious, stay safe…and hit publish.