I Need to Grieve the Future I Lost
Dec. 26th, 2021 01:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
genderjumperFrom late 2016 through the end of graduate school, I was low-key fixated on grief. I had lost my grandfather, two very important relationships, and enough of my sense of self that I committed to being reborn. Sometimes it's just easier to start from scratch than to sort through so much. But even then, I think there was a part of Free (that is, the person I was before, his name was Free) that tried to endure. And although my family is doing better than we have any right to 21 months into the global pandemic and the ongoing frisson of capitalism making its (last?) stand, I'm having a really hard time seeing any future that isn't still hindered by the flotsam of Free's dreams, expectations, and idealistic trust. All year I've been wrestling with whether to sit still where it's safe or dart forward into risk, and to my detriment I have had this conversation mostly internally. Moreover, because I have spent about two years utterly unable to see the future -- I mean, not like I'm psychic, but I am used to having some "sense" of what is possible, where to direct my energy -- I have also walled off the past. What is happening now is about the present, therefore I should live in the present -- right?
It's spring of my final semester in graduate school. My thesis has been taking a little too long, but it's coming together now. I'm going to hunker down on the content analysis (already a compromise for the focus group I had originally planned), clean up my statistics, and defend before the end of the semester. I'll scrounge together money (or donations, or gifts) to pay for graduation accoutrements and do it up right: rainbow sash, graduation photos, tickets to the ceremony -- I'm even going to try to get a nice big frame to match the one I got for my Bachelor's.
My topic is a bit niche, but I'm highly flexible and I'm eager to get into an office environment. I know it probably won't be as perfect a fit as the place I worked straight out of college, but it'll be steady and reliable. These past few years have been so unstable, I daydream about working a 9-to-5.
I've gotten my family on board with Chicago, so we'll start there. Maybe the Alzheimer's Association, or one of the strong universities or medical centers in the area. Chicago is expensive, so I'm hoping to start somewhere around $60,000, but I can accept less for a dream job and/or opportunities for quick advancement. My idea is a well-insulated apartment in or near downtown -- not The Loop of course, but you know, something requiring an elevator. My partner and Kiddo have never lived in the middle of a dense city, though, so we'll probably compromise: something in the demi-urban areas of Chicago -- close to the ground with a little grass, full of families and pets -- or even a townhouse in walking distance from an L stop. My ideal is to not have to own a lawn mower or a car, but I'll have to introduce them gradually to the sounds and smells of real cities. Kiddo is excited about Illinois because they have native skunks and her tribe is from there; my partner just wants a dishwasher and a quiet place for when she has a migraine.
Once we sell my house, we'll have a bit of a buffer to help with the move and settle old debts. I'll owe about $65K for student loans, plus I have about $25K in credit card debt that dates back to my time as a caregiver and may have some lingering medical bills that got stacked and ignored (*ETA: oh yeah and a $50K home equity loan; these may not all get paid off before the move, but we'd pay down the high-interest stuff first!). The house is valued at about $185,000, so we could afford the move and a modest down payment (but I'd rather rent for a year before we commit to buying a condo/house); more importantly, we could afford for my partner to cut back her hours, even take six months off to rest and acclimate. Her chronic conditions have been less predictable, and it would be great to take the stress of working off her shoulders for a while. I doubt she'd ever stop working entirely -- she's very skilled and enjoys her work -- but she deserves to find the Goldilocks amount. Hopefully we could live off my income, so hers could go toward savings and vacations. I don't think we'd be able to homeschool Kiddo as laxly as we do here, but we have found evidence of democracy schools in the area and hopefully they won't be too expensive.
I'm pretty open about the work itself. I just want an office job where I commute every day. I'd resist the urge to get airpods and just meditate on my steps and the sounds around me (just like I did in New York and D.C. back in the day). I want a supervisor who sets clear expectations and gives me the room to do it, a team who believes in what we're doing, and perhaps a little free time to continue my own pursuits (especially if my work gets very far away from caregiving).
Everywhere I look in DFW, I see broken dreams of "community", so I'd like to start fresh in Chicago: queerlesque, academia, maybe I'll even find ways to bring my old relationship coaching or my budding queer identity into my specialty: dementia caregivers. I know a couple of people there already, and I'm looking forward to escalating some Facefriends and Insta-crushes into IRL solidarity. I am more eager than exasperated at the thought of learning new nonmonogamous spaces. At least I'll have a friend or two to show me around, and I don't think it'll take long to figure out which groups are having the hard conversations and which ones are just full of people trying to get laid. I don't assume my partner or I will start anything serious any time soon, but it would be really fucking nice to feel like the opportunity is there and not have to worry about Texan Libertarianism or ghosting exes showing up and spoiling a party. We'll miss a couple of people here, but most of our ties are already pretty weak here. My partner's family knows it could be good for us, my family and I still aren't really talking (I admit, moving without telling them would be an ultimate fuck off, but I've been looking forward to it.)
And just to be in(/near) a real city again! New neighborhoods and art and experiences to try! Food is much less of a hassle up there. It won't all be gluten-free deep dish, but then most of the food I used to miss when I was on the East Coast I can't eat any more anyway. We even looked at the ecological projections for the country while doing our research. The Midwest is one of the few parts of the country that anticipates no major uptick in drought or hurricanes over the next century; the weather there is supposed to get warmer and more volatile (thunderstorms, tornadoes), but we're already used to that. At least we'll have snow, too! The climate is a big improvement because of the seasons. Without perpetu-summer, my partner and I can hopefully take a few months off from "seasonal" allergies, which should do a lot to improve her migraines. We're also hopeful that the stronger state and public transit up there mean it'll be easier to handle medical and behavioral health needs -- none of us is exactly trauma-free at this point, but it would be nice to live somewhere that takes this seriously.
Big picture politics looks less scary, too. It doesn't really matter whether Trump is reelected or not, the beliefs and systems that put him in power aren't going anywhere. It no longer feels safer to be a freak in a red state than to have to blend in in a blue state. It might be nice to tell my partner's father about the great healthcare and public services we utilize, but political relief is only a bonus: it'll be nice to just live in a place where people aren't in denial about urban challenges. It's not perfect, of course, and I only know a pittance of the Chicagoland area, but I'm excited to find out. If and when racial justice issues flare up again, maybe we'll be healthy and financially stable enough to participate in more demonstrations, volunteer, and donate more than we've been able to here.
Yup, it's all looking great ahead. Just gotta finish this thesis and GTFO. I'm a little embarrassed it's taken this long, but I've found that grad school is just as much about logistics as it is about work. I've worked hard to finish this degree, and I cannot wait to see where it takes me and my family. The trust they've placed in me through this process is incalculable, and I cannot wait to make a home that is just as new to us all together. I'm ready to step up and start this next journey.
But I'm not. I'm still building intentions around the future Free saw for himself and his (my) family. Many times this year, I was tempted to give up on taking the pandemic this seriously and just make a go of that future anyway. But something would hold me back, and sure enough a new variant wave would appear shortly thereafter. Guess I'm not completely out of touch with the future, after all -- maybe it's me, my perception/read. So before I start a deeper thinky on where I need to direct my focus in 2022, I think I need to do what I never did when I had my heart set on it: I need to write out the intention, the plan, the expectation. I'm not sure I will be able to exorcise the whole thing unless I actually see it lain out before me.
It's spring of my final semester in graduate school. My thesis has been taking a little too long, but it's coming together now. I'm going to hunker down on the content analysis (already a compromise for the focus group I had originally planned), clean up my statistics, and defend before the end of the semester. I'll scrounge together money (or donations, or gifts) to pay for graduation accoutrements and do it up right: rainbow sash, graduation photos, tickets to the ceremony -- I'm even going to try to get a nice big frame to match the one I got for my Bachelor's.
My topic is a bit niche, but I'm highly flexible and I'm eager to get into an office environment. I know it probably won't be as perfect a fit as the place I worked straight out of college, but it'll be steady and reliable. These past few years have been so unstable, I daydream about working a 9-to-5.
I've gotten my family on board with Chicago, so we'll start there. Maybe the Alzheimer's Association, or one of the strong universities or medical centers in the area. Chicago is expensive, so I'm hoping to start somewhere around $60,000, but I can accept less for a dream job and/or opportunities for quick advancement. My idea is a well-insulated apartment in or near downtown -- not The Loop of course, but you know, something requiring an elevator. My partner and Kiddo have never lived in the middle of a dense city, though, so we'll probably compromise: something in the demi-urban areas of Chicago -- close to the ground with a little grass, full of families and pets -- or even a townhouse in walking distance from an L stop. My ideal is to not have to own a lawn mower or a car, but I'll have to introduce them gradually to the sounds and smells of real cities. Kiddo is excited about Illinois because they have native skunks and her tribe is from there; my partner just wants a dishwasher and a quiet place for when she has a migraine.
Once we sell my house, we'll have a bit of a buffer to help with the move and settle old debts. I'll owe about $65K for student loans, plus I have about $25K in credit card debt that dates back to my time as a caregiver and may have some lingering medical bills that got stacked and ignored (*ETA: oh yeah and a $50K home equity loan; these may not all get paid off before the move, but we'd pay down the high-interest stuff first!). The house is valued at about $185,000, so we could afford the move and a modest down payment (but I'd rather rent for a year before we commit to buying a condo/house); more importantly, we could afford for my partner to cut back her hours, even take six months off to rest and acclimate. Her chronic conditions have been less predictable, and it would be great to take the stress of working off her shoulders for a while. I doubt she'd ever stop working entirely -- she's very skilled and enjoys her work -- but she deserves to find the Goldilocks amount. Hopefully we could live off my income, so hers could go toward savings and vacations. I don't think we'd be able to homeschool Kiddo as laxly as we do here, but we have found evidence of democracy schools in the area and hopefully they won't be too expensive.
I'm pretty open about the work itself. I just want an office job where I commute every day. I'd resist the urge to get airpods and just meditate on my steps and the sounds around me (just like I did in New York and D.C. back in the day). I want a supervisor who sets clear expectations and gives me the room to do it, a team who believes in what we're doing, and perhaps a little free time to continue my own pursuits (especially if my work gets very far away from caregiving).
Everywhere I look in DFW, I see broken dreams of "community", so I'd like to start fresh in Chicago: queerlesque, academia, maybe I'll even find ways to bring my old relationship coaching or my budding queer identity into my specialty: dementia caregivers. I know a couple of people there already, and I'm looking forward to escalating some Facefriends and Insta-crushes into IRL solidarity. I am more eager than exasperated at the thought of learning new nonmonogamous spaces. At least I'll have a friend or two to show me around, and I don't think it'll take long to figure out which groups are having the hard conversations and which ones are just full of people trying to get laid. I don't assume my partner or I will start anything serious any time soon, but it would be really fucking nice to feel like the opportunity is there and not have to worry about Texan Libertarianism or ghosting exes showing up and spoiling a party. We'll miss a couple of people here, but most of our ties are already pretty weak here. My partner's family knows it could be good for us, my family and I still aren't really talking (I admit, moving without telling them would be an ultimate fuck off, but I've been looking forward to it.)
And just to be in(/near) a real city again! New neighborhoods and art and experiences to try! Food is much less of a hassle up there. It won't all be gluten-free deep dish, but then most of the food I used to miss when I was on the East Coast I can't eat any more anyway. We even looked at the ecological projections for the country while doing our research. The Midwest is one of the few parts of the country that anticipates no major uptick in drought or hurricanes over the next century; the weather there is supposed to get warmer and more volatile (thunderstorms, tornadoes), but we're already used to that. At least we'll have snow, too! The climate is a big improvement because of the seasons. Without perpetu-summer, my partner and I can hopefully take a few months off from "seasonal" allergies, which should do a lot to improve her migraines. We're also hopeful that the stronger state and public transit up there mean it'll be easier to handle medical and behavioral health needs -- none of us is exactly trauma-free at this point, but it would be nice to live somewhere that takes this seriously.
Big picture politics looks less scary, too. It doesn't really matter whether Trump is reelected or not, the beliefs and systems that put him in power aren't going anywhere. It no longer feels safer to be a freak in a red state than to have to blend in in a blue state. It might be nice to tell my partner's father about the great healthcare and public services we utilize, but political relief is only a bonus: it'll be nice to just live in a place where people aren't in denial about urban challenges. It's not perfect, of course, and I only know a pittance of the Chicagoland area, but I'm excited to find out. If and when racial justice issues flare up again, maybe we'll be healthy and financially stable enough to participate in more demonstrations, volunteer, and donate more than we've been able to here.
Yup, it's all looking great ahead. Just gotta finish this thesis and GTFO. I'm a little embarrassed it's taken this long, but I've found that grad school is just as much about logistics as it is about work. I've worked hard to finish this degree, and I cannot wait to see where it takes me and my family. The trust they've placed in me through this process is incalculable, and I cannot wait to make a home that is just as new to us all together. I'm ready to step up and start this next journey.
no subject
Date: 2021-12-26 08:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-12-27 04:06 am (UTC)If this is a weight you truly feel, and not a burden you can get out of by deciding that hypothetical futures are not beloved attachments, then I will be here to listen.