Decisions

I am on vacation and spent my morning in bed reading.  Amazon is making a fortune from me.  This week I downloaded and read three books thus far.  It's dangerous this Kindle.  I have millions of books at my fingertips and pressing the "buy now" button doesn't really feel like spending money.

I digress because my real reason for posting this afternoon is to verbalize that I am at a crossroads of sorts.  While surfing the web this morning, I looked up University of Iowa's non fiction MFA program.  Applications are due in September.  I want to apply.  I can't believe I just wrote that.  It's true.  I do.

I think to myself, how could this work?  We have our house in the Inland Empire, I have my dream job as a public defender, Adrian has his practice and we have the moms and our dogs.

I have done this moving thing many times before and want to make sure I am thinking this through.  By applying I know I am opening up a possibility and a potential hard decision to make later down the road.  Am I ready for this?

When I graduated from law school, I moved to Houston without even thinking it through.  I never talked to Adrian about it.  We had been together eleven or twelve years (the years blur together after ten).  I should have talked to him about it, but I didn't.  Instead, I just up and moved.  Then, when I decided I was done with Texas, I moved to San Francisco to join him in dental school without much asking and no job search.  I took the first job that came along .

Three years later, I did it again.  A few months after my dad died, I got mad at a partner at the boutique law firm I worked at in downtown San Francisco and started looking for jobs.  I saw the ad for the largest firm in the Inland Empire and applied.  I never even told Adrian.  When I told Adrian I got an interview, he was flummoxed.  "Why would you move?  I have more than a year left of dental school." 

I told him that my mom needed me, I didn't want to give up the opportunity, my excuses went on and on.  Ultimately, I pushed Adrian's words and worries aside and moved back home.  Adrian was left to finish his last year of dental school alone.  Looking back, it was a mistake.  I bought a house in an overpriced market and the job at the "new" law firm was worse than the law firm I left.

This time, it will be different.  It has to be different.  I am married and part of a team.  I am not doing this because I am scared.  Instead, I feel as if a higher power is pushing me toward this.  The only time I am truly happy is when I have finished a piece of writing.

Maybe I will apply to both University of Iowa and UC Riverside.  A girl needs options.