Hello again and happy International Women’s Day. I hope you celebrated by reading something cool a woman wrote. And if not, well, here you are; I will have to do!
What’s new? Well…we have begun to contemplate moving. This is…emotionally fraught territory for me, for dozens of reasons. I am a Cancer, I don’t love change, I am a homebody who feels a strong sense of attachment to where I’m rooted. Madison is the only adult home I’ve ever had. I’ve had seven addresses in my thirteen years here but every single one of them (save the dorms) felt like home to me, because this city feels like home to me. It is, objectively, a great city for a youngish white woman in government and that’s why I came here. But now I’m not in government anymore and I have to rebuild somehow. My choices are to move, to enter a new field, or both.
All of my friends and family have, at some point, lived somewhere else and I envy that experience. They’ve grown and stretched themselves and lived in ways that I just haven’t. I’ve traveled, and I’m so glad for that, but of course spending less than a week somewhere running from monument to museum isn’t the same as finding an apartment, getting a job, searching for a new doctor, scouting out the best Indian food delivery. Making new friends, joining a gym or finding a few good walking routes, figuring out an alien city. Rebuilding a life, basically. All of that sounds terrifying and exhausting and…maybe fun? Maybe…the kind of challenge I haven’t had enough of?
I don’t make friends terribly easily. I am introverted to a fault. Most of my closest friendships will soon enter their second decade. Those people got to know me, and I them, before #adulting was a thing, when we were the purest and most honest versions of ourselves. We’ve all been several different people in the intervening years, as teenagers and college students and hungry 20somethings and now, in our thirties, I think we’re maybe, hopefully, back to some sense of authenticity. Not that those other selves were *in*authentic…but you know…Growth, building, learning. Images of beautiful smiling fit people hiking a mountain with clichéd hashtags abound.
You know what I mean.
So what else. In the absence of any formal job title, I have begun thinking of myself as A Writer, if not quite a Real Writer. I don’t do much Writing these days, or even much writing (see: neglect of this blog). I’ve published only one piece (which I will continue plugging until the day I die, or until I manage to publish something better, whichever comes first). Unemployment has not made me a much more productive writer, but it’s really about momentum…the more I do it, the more I’ll do it. So cheers to that.
Sconnie Molly 