When in Doubt, Sit on Porch

I moved--to Kansas. A few brief months after my original post (where I mentioned I couldn't find a full-time teaching job), I was hired to teach at a small college in Kansas. So here I am. In Kansas.

It isn't a bad place to be. Once you get past the barrage of Dorothy jokes: Are you going to meet Toto? Make sure you pick a house that is bolted down. Do you need a pair of red crystal shoes? Pack your broom!

In seriousness, the town is small, but the people are welcoming. I have a full-time job with salary and benefits, I have an office, and have oodles of "kids" that I see every day. When I come home from work I am generally happy to be home. I cook, I wash dishes, I watch video content streamed to my television set. On most days I'm content.

But there are other days when it's a little harder to be content. You see, on most days I am busy and am content to think that my family and my closest friends are busy as well. They are off doing grad school and Peace Corps and jobs. They are in Minnesota, Ecuador, Illinois, Iowa, California, Oregon, Washington DC. We are all spread out. We are all separated. And that's easier to take. Easier than sitting around on a long weekend twiddling thumbs while the majority of my family gathers around a campfire and a sizable contingent of my friends gather in Illinois for a birthday party I couldn't attend. It's a silly thing to harbor a tiny bit of bitterness for the happiness of others.

And so I turn to my porch. I've found that the porch can cure so much of what ails me. It's a quiet place where I watch the cars drive by, where I watch the trees sway in the Kansas breezes / windstorms, where I watch people come and go at the law office next door.

And tonight, I will march myself a block down that street to a little bar / coffeehouse (because why not be both?) and hang out with some very fun people.

And someday my life will be as full and complex here as it was in Illinois, in Iowa, in Paris. Because that's just how life works out.

For now, when I'm in doubt, I'll just retreat to the porch.