Hypothetically Speaking

Independence is a topic that’s been on my mind frequently in recent months. Two months from now I’m leaving the place I’ve made my home for the past seven years for a big city that I know from a tourist/visitor’s perspective, but have no idea how to live and get around in. My pool of friends and acquaintances is about to shrink like a puddle in July heat. I’m leaving the job that I’ve worked at for the past three years, where there have never been more than ten people in the office, for something completely new where I will have thousands of co-workers and be doing unfamiliar tasks. I have always lived with family or roommates, and now for the first time I will be living completely alone.

Put like that, I’m not quite sure this moving business is such a good idea. And that’s why it is exactly what I need.

North Carolina is a safety net. It is a safety net that I love passionately. I can’t imagine getting by without the friends I’ve made, without the activities that I love. It would be the easiest thing in the world to stay at my current job, continue living in Carrboro, and float along without ever having to challenge myself, try anything new, or make any bold decisions.

That’s why I have to go.

Eventually DC will become as familiar as North Carolina. I’ll learn the side streets of Arlington, where to buy my groceries, who sells the best cup of coffee. I’ll adjust to working in a huge office and dressing up like a fancy person. Maybe I’ll even start paying attention to current events and stop finding out about everything a week later, when Newsweek tells me about it. I will find places to work out, to discuss writing, to go horseback riding. I will stretch and expand the tiny network of people I know into a solid group of friends.

But it won’t happen right away. And it’s that period of the unknown, that stretch of time in which I will be very much on my own trying to figure things out, that I need the most.

And hypothetically speaking, if it turns out that I am pathetic and sad and alone in my apartment at night, at least I can get a kitten to keep me company. I don’t need to be completely independent.

This week’s synchroblog topic was Independence. You can read the others here:

Truly Local–Karma’s Fool : Independence–the rebel i : a thing is itself–plow and rain : interbeing–m : fear itself–i write to be rid of things : Escape Velocity, Part III–Word Shepherd : Bodily Interruptions–passionately pensive : Co-dependence–muddled dreamer