The Direction Life Takes Us

Writing Stats:Saturday, October 4, 2003@10:20 p.m.

NOTE: This one is about what happened to me a month ago, also the reasoning behind my decision to take a month off. The next chapter of the Kara/Jed saga begins in this issue, but is more of a reflection.

Everything has a season, and Northern Michigan is no stranger to the slowing down of those warm summer nights sitting on the patio drinking beers with friends, into the cold harsh reality of autumn and winter. As for relationships, there were several spring romances souring into Winter before my very eyes.

For me however, the season hadn’t changed since last June. I had been living in winter for far too long. It seems in fact, like a whole lot of winter is headed my way, as those of you who have been reading this column for awhile have realized that there has been a dry spell of new material lately. The reasoning for this, is because I’ve entered a literal permanent winter, as I moved from Kalamazoo into an area of the state where the first of October brought snowfall and accumulation.

Things hadn’t seemed like they were headed for dry spell territory with Kara. By the time she moved up here, she and Jed were still screwing like rabbits at every opportunity, although the same problems they had had before were still ever present. Jed as always was chomping cars and taking numbers, and Kara was taking…a lot of time lesson planning and preparing for the school year that was coming up faster than the twists and turns of an Alias episode.

So, all of this sound intriguing? Well, you’ll have to tune in next week…and the week after…because this week I’m exploring my relationship with my interview skills.

Myself, I was preparing for a move. My lease at Country Club Park Apartments in Kalamazoo was coming up fast as well, and I had finally reached the conclusion that no school districts were going to come a knocking, so I had registered for a brand new semester at the college I swore I’d never give any more money to. My new roommate to be was antsy because she had half of her stuff packed, and half a day to not only find a new place to live, but figure out how all of it was supposed to make it from point A to point B. As luck would have it, Anna found us a two story house for 600 a month, right next door to her current one, with three bedrooms to fit the three roommates we planned on having. Unfortunately, one door down meant all the difference between the good side of town and the bad side of town.

While moving my first truckload of boxes into the new house, I began to wonder what kind of a year this was going to be. Was I going to actually enjoy being a student again? I had just finished a six year stint with a weekly date with textbooks and number two pencils, three of which had been spent in the same apartment. The only thing that had changed were the people I lived with…or had they?

Now my life was in turmoil. I had registered for classes but not yet paid, I had bought textbooks but not yet done that pre-semester skim I generally gave them. I was packing and unpacking boxes at lightening speed.

I had decided that while things were going to be strained for awhile, because of my disappointment about where my life was going, I was still going to take things as I had been all summer. Whatever comes, comes, whatever goes, goes.

Which is why when my phone rang twice in one day with principals from across the state, I had to bonk myself on the head and go “Gee, who didn’t see this one coming?”

I decided not to tell anyone. Allegan had been my idea of a dream job but I think I had jinxed it by talking too much, but now I was torn with another major possible life change. I had a new lease, a new life, and a smelly suit that didn’t have time to make it to the cleaners before my first interview. What if I talked about the interviews and didn’t get the job? But then, on the other hand, what if I didn’t talk about the interviews and DID get the job?

In an economy run by Republicans, with an unemployment rate soaring by the day, I couldn’t say no to a job. Could I say goodbye to the life I had braced myself for having?

While all this was going on, Kara was up north having some issues of her own. Jed while still head over heels for Kara had not been able to make it up for longer than one night in three weeks. Kara called me on a semi regular basis asking for advice in how to conduct the relationship from afar without pulling her hair out. I told her I didn’t quite know what to say at the moment, especially since my life was as turbulent as it had been since April. Advice just wasn’t coming from the advice guy anymore. She poked and prodded as to what was stressing me out and I spilled the beans. One person couldn’t possibly jinx the job prospect.

Four was pushing it. I had already broken down and told Anna, Nick and Jake.

I hauled the Portfolio out of mothballs, polished it up and put it in a new white binder. I gassed up the car, and headed out the door.

The first interview went well, but ended up being a part time job that couldn’t fit into the class schedule it had taken me half the summer to work out. It was forty minutes away via I-94 and while I felt good about the prospect, it was not exactly the job I wanted.

So I began pouring my energies into the second one, in a little town called Mesick that despite several trips to Northern Michigan in my lifetime, I had never heard of before. Upon further research, I learned that not only was it a straight shot up US 131, but that it was also a 20 minute drive from the town that Kara now called home: Cadillac.

Definitely not wanting to get my hopes up, I broke my own rule and called Kara again to tell her that my next job possibility was just a hop, skip and a jump away from her job actuality. In essence, I actually was getting my hopes up.

The day of the second interview arrived, so I hopped back into my smelly suit and started driving three hours towards the next in what was becoming a long line of rejections. I had taken the day off of work by calling in *cough* *cough* sick and was down to the last of my gas money in what had become my budget…as those funds my father had left me were now specifically for college.

Five minutes before I reached the middle school my Truck decided to take my life in a whole new direction…towards a ditch.

No matter how hard I tried steering, Scotty was going every which way other than the direction I wanted it to. It was the final insulting metaphor in my life, only this one was more than just a metaphor. I managed to get parked (badly might I add) in the parking lot and into the small library before I was greeted by an 8th grader who took me on a guided tour of the building.

It was perfect. The wing dedicated to the 8th grade was 4 classrooms next to each other. The room I was to teach in should the job be mine was spacious, with a wonderful desk and bookshelves galore. I loved the building, and as I made my way into the interview, I loved the principal, and the other teachers who would be my colleagues once again, should I get the job.

I left the interview and got back into my truck just as my cell phone rang. It was Kara, who was excited to learn she had just had a geography lesson of her own, and realized that I was fifteen minutes away.

I was so desperately exhausted, and with no end in sight as my truck was making sure it was going to be a long, eventful trip home, I told her I didn’t want to meet for dinner after all. Still, as Jed learned throughout the course of their relationship together, Kara is one person whose mind, once made up, is unchangeable, and tonight, she had her mind set towards dinner with Dave.

I told her how the interview went and she was excited for me, but I didn’t want to get my hopes up. We were halfway through taco salads at Lakeside Charlie’s when my phone rang again. “Unknown Name/Unknown Number” flashing on my caller ID my hopes suddenly sprang up again. The same thing had been displayed on the phone when Mesick called me, and suddenly I was wondering if maybe I was employable after all.

Alas, it wasn’t meant to be. Instead of finding I had a new job, I learned I had a new problem. My truck was swerving every which way, meaning my 3 hour drive was going to become at least a 4 or 5 hour one. I now had to make it home as quickly as possible, as the new apartment I had just moved into had just been broken into.

Kara and I cut dinner short, grabbed “to go” boxes, and I was back on the road.

By the time I made it home, I was greeted by two roommates sitting on the sofa their heads in their hands. The robbers were a group of kids in the neighborhood, and hadn’t made it out with much. Still, having been robbed before, I know how hard it is to get over the feeling of violation that comes with the breaking and entering territory.

We talked briefly, and I, exhausted, dragged myself up the stairs and into my bedroom, where I hit my pillow and was off into dreamland.

“I got the job.” Was the next thing I heard myself saying, and I was half convinced the phone call from Mesick had been little more than part of one night’s sleep designed to get my hopes up for something in my life to finally go right.

The next problem was…I started in 4 days, which meant I had to get my car fixed, find a place to live and get my shit up North, all while lesson planning and preparing for my first day as a real teacher.

Stories for my personal web-log. Not for Rhythm of Life.

Friends come through for you in your hour of need, and Kara, Jake and Nick were no exception, particularly in this matter. Nick and Jake helped me pack, Nick went above and beyond by actually helping me load into the trailer, AND coordinating my rental car/Uhaul rental, and Kara? After screaming louder and longer into the phone than my mother had, Kara offered up the most important thing of all. A floor to crash on while I sought out my first apartment as a fully employed, insurance card holding member of society.

As I put the dust back ON to my Portfolio and placed it back into a packed box, I smiled sadly at the life I had just whirlwinded out of, and prepared myself for the life I was whirlwinding into.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Dave has arrived.