Cabeeb

August 3, 2010

Now What?

I remember saying about a month ago that once I had wrapped up my job at Pursuant and moved out of my apartment, it would be pretty smooth sailing from that point on.

Oh young, naive Cabeeb.

For two months or longer, I had been working towards a defined, dated goal. That was to have left my job and moved out of my apartment by the time my lease was up on July 18th. That was my first destination on the larger journey up to Chicago, and I’d been working towards it since since mid-May. It was extremely stressful, but it gave some definition to my purpose. Even if everything else was a giant whirlwind, that end goal was unwavering.

Now that stage has finally wrapped up. I exited Pursuant stage-left, crammed 90% of my possessions into a 5′ x 15′ padlocked room, and moved into a temporarily vacant bedroom in my parents’ house. That all took place in one of the most hectic 4 day periods I can remember, but it was done.

Yet the week following that milestone saw me depressed and overwhelmed. Somehow, having no deadlines hanging over my head was just as stressful as the previous weeks of several simultaneously culminating. The stress was of a different nature, of course, but it was just as potent and crippling.

I knew where I needed to go – I needed to get some money saved up and enough work lined up to get me up to Chicago – but I had no idea how to get there. Instead of a million little hops that all needed to be taken nearly simultaneously, I saw before me a giant chasm and no idea the next step I should take.

So, I just started slowly chipping away at it (I’m changing metaphors here; sorry about that). Every day, I would do as much work as I could on my current freelance projects and try to get my head wrapped around all of the projects and tasks I needed to do now and in the next few weeks. My mind was a giant pile of mush, and I just couldn’t seem to get a handle on everything.

Fortunately, every day got a little better as things started wrapping up or solidifying a bit. Now, three weeks since leaving Pursuant, I finally feel like I’m in a good place. My various freelance projects have been keeping me busy, so I am financially set to actually make the move. My next step is to figure out what I’m going to do when I finally get up north, and I think that will come together before too much longer. So, I still don’t have a solid time frame, but I am definitely getting closer every day. Things could fall together tomorrow, and I’d find myself living in Chicago before next weekend.

But I’ve heard that before.

4 Posted in Personal | Ambiguity | Chicago | Confusion | Freelance | Mixed Metaphors | Pursuant | The Unknown | Transition