Riding Off Into the Sunset

Currently I am pushing open the gates of a whole new life. Each day passes like a countdown and the New England world around me that I’ve come to call home seems more and more temporary. I find myself wanting to savor the very place I’ve decided to leave, even though I am positive that this sudden shift in realities is just what my wife and I want, need and deserve.

There are few things in life as wonderful as a complete overhaul when it has been chosen rather than forced. It overwhelms you with good feelings like courage, wonder and even relief. There’s nervousness in there too, but the excitement trumps it more often than not. You toss off the security blanket of your rut and plunge headlong into alien territory. Every new day is like an adventure now instead of a rerun. Sure, the security and familiarity is gone but a side effect of that is breaking the chains of monotony.

People don’t realize the prisons they make of their own lives and the shackles they place upon themselves. They settle more often than not. They give up on being happy or mistake happiness for just not being miserable. They let contentment become their version of happy. They refuse to take a chance on happiness out of fear of losing that ol’ comfortable contentment. We’re all guilty of it at some point. Realizing the error and acting on it is key. Living in a rut ain’t living at all.

As I walked up the sidewalk in front of my duplex, kicking cans and other litter out of my way, I listened to the familiar roar of cars zipping past my tiny, dead lawn. It had been just another day that I spent waiting to come home and lock myself away from the stressful, rat race city I lived in. I was living now for escapism: movies and books and anything that would take me out of my actual life.

My life, therefore, was being wasted. Rather than planning an actual escape I was floating in daydreams of it; living vicariously through old movie cowboys and such.

My wife came home looking the same way I felt, only prettier. She was worn out on the congested city life too. We’d been daydreaming of getting out, going country, getting back to our roots. I felt not just a responsibility to myself but also to my wife. I couldn’t let us go on being unhappy in our own home, feeling like prisoners in our own town. After all, what we wanted was simple enough. In fact it was simplicity itself that we craved: a yard and a porch with maybe an old dog. More wood and less concrete. A little southern hospitality. Privacy. Quiet. Peace.

These are things we could acquire by moving down south, maybe Tennessee or the Carolinas. They were also all things we could almost never have living so close to a big city. City life is essential for some. I can understand the appeal but I just don’t prefer it. I have done all I care to do living in a city. I have mentally retired from it.

It is a wild lunge to leave a company you’ve been with for years and start up with a whole new one. But I applied for a very promising new job and I got it. But as excited as I am about that, this entry is about life change rather than job change. After all, the job is in North Carolina, whereas we are currently in Massachusetts. This means a total rebuilding of a life. Not just a new career, but a new home in a new town filled with new people, much like when I left the swamps of Florida for the hustle of Massachusetts, all those years ago.

Sometimes change can come out of necessity. Sometimes you are forced to change without wanting to. But both good and bad can come of that. Still, making the choice to change is something else. You hit your own reset button and it is up to you to decide how you want to play the game this time around.

It is true that we’re all victims to the chaos of the universe, but we all play a large hand in our fate. I think to really enjoy and experience life you have to be willing to gamble on yourself. You have to throw away that ol' security blanket before it becomes a noose around your neck.

But before you can really make a change of life you have to have a change of mind, and often that calls upon a change of heart. Stop blaming others for where you're at. Stop backing down to everything that stands in your way. Stop letting other people tell you what you are supposed to think is important. You have to get your priorities lined up. You have to make sacrifices. You have to be ambitious as Hell or don’t get off the couch in the first place.

Be ready to shake off the naysayers, skeptics and cynics, many of which might have disguised themselves as friends. Some people will be happy for you and encourage you to chase your dream, whereas others will only focus on how your change inconveniences them. Be ready for that resistance and don’t let other people’s opinions distort your own. Don’t give in to their fears. When you’ve come far enough to put a plan into play you know how serious you are. Nothing should change that.

It is too easy to coast and let the nag of what you want be muted into submission. You can get by, pass the time, and pay the bills. You can live in the life of the mind. I sure have.  But what is the point if you’re not working towards something? Why stay somewhere if you don’t have to? Why put off what you can get done right away? This big show is all too short for that.

I know I’m ramblin'. I have been too scatterbrained by the tornado of possibilities these initial steps have offered. Knowing that next week I’m going to pick out a quiet house on a quiet street to live in is enough to make me tap dance.

Thanksgiving just passed and my gratitude has come into perspective.

I’m grateful for a good, new job in a tough economy. I’m grateful for all of the friends I’m going to miss so much. I’m grateful for my change of heart, mind and life. I’m grateful to be taking the wild ride. Most of all I am grateful for a loving wife who trusts and believes in me enough to take this wild ride with me.

I’m grateful for change.

If you want to change, I advise doing it while you can and before you need to. You may be surprised at how good it feels to ride off into the sunset. Take it from a cowboy who's done it more than once.