Exodus

”The best I can do is ‘gear up’ for when the Day of the Bard finally arrives. Because I’m not the only one who feels like life is leaving him behind, and therefore I’m not really left behind.”
—from the blog post Monte Carlo Fallacy, posted December 3, 2008.

”Here’s to the next time I’ll find myself in a tuxedo: may it be when I am surrounded by truest fellowship and under the best of conditions as well as the merriest of circumstances. And on that Day of the Bard, I’ll never have reason to look back to this, to St. Louis, or to Overland Park.”
—from the blog post Quiet Dignity, posted December 12, 2009.


Missouri hasn’t been nice to me in the years I’ve lived here since coming back from Ohio.

Now I’m on my way to Austin, Texas. I stuffed my car with as much as I could fit in it and headed out yesterday. No Uhaul, no Penske. Just me. No furniture, no television. No need.

I seem to be the only one who isn’t sentimental over this move. Maybe the past couple years were so bleak for so long for me that I have no sentiment left. Maybe my mind has been conditioned after starting so many wistful, optimistic sentences with “someday” so that it just hasn’t sunk in yet. Maybe.

I had something of a sendoff yesterday as I passed through Columbia. Then I headed to Kansas City to spend a couple nights, where I am now. Friday night I’ll crash in Wichita with a friend from BGSU. Saturday I’ll drift down to Texas, stopping for coffee outside of Dallas to meet another friend from BGSU, then finish the journey.

I suppose I have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Sure, it would be nice if more of my friends were within driving distance of where I’m going to be, but how is that any different when you think about it? I mean, how many of my friends from grad school have I even seen in the past four years? I’m used to long distance by now.

Besides, who wants to live in the same state for most of their lives? It chafes me that I’ve spent the last thirteen months working at the school I attended as a kid. Oh, it chafes.

So that’s it. No deep thoughts, no life-affirming milestone speeches, no flowery paragraphs for your consideration, no sentimental or even particularly thoughtful discourse. Just onward and upward. Time to breath free air and start living Life After Grad School. Something like that. Operation GTFO is a go.

It’s about time.