My view: Frangipani, palm, coconut, mango trees. Bright orange cushions wedged just right into worn white chairs. Turquoise, teal, cerulean sea glass collection. Horatio, my Dr. Seuss-looking lovable plant. My "beach this way" sign - ever askew from pesky perched birds, though ever-accurately pointing down the street. White lattice. Herb boxes atop the dog house. The dogs, of course, and the cats, for the moment all sleeping lazily on the cool patio floor, but soon Dora will attack little Oscar's fluffy tail and the playful commotion will commence- an endless source of entertainment. If I descend the three steps from the patio to the lawn, and peek over the white picket fence, I'll catch a glimpse of the Caribbean Sea two blocks down the road. It's a dream, and I'm leaving it.
I'm leaving it.
The thought is nearly too much to bear, despite months and months of deliberation over my "best interests". My mind drifts back two years to when I moved to Barbados. "But...you're never going to come back!" proclaimed some of my nearest and dearest. Just a year, I responded. Maybe two.
But now I've reached that two year mark, coinciding with my twenty-fifth birthday, my self-ascribed "get serious" age. "What does that even mean?!" my soul cries. A job, my brain hastily answers.
The gap in my resume since my work permit expired grows wider by the month. Opportunities for legal jobs here are bleak - it was a miracle my former company finessed their way through the first work permit, via means neither my boss nor I will ever totally understand beyond "our guy". My justification for staying here is weakening, my anxiety over becoming obsolete in the market is growing. Convention calls.
I have an interview next week with a company back home that in theory I'd love to work for. It was reassuring to even get the call after I applied for the position - I'm still desirable! I'm starting to experience, however, that theory and practice are two entirely different ball games. All I can picture is sitting in standstill traffic at 8 a.m. on a mid-week morning, on some 4-lane highway, during a terrible snow storm. Maybe it's not even snow, it could be freezing rain--I can't really tell.
Coming off a weekend that saw me sitting with Phil's dear family on the patio in front of Sea Foam Haciendas, the very same beachfront apartments where Lindsay and I spent a memorable relaxed evening when I first fell in love with Barbados; a weekend that took myself and close friends on an afternoon sail down the West Coast that lasted until well beyond sunset; a weekend, basically, filled with the dreamiest Caribbean scenes.
...fast forward one week....
I'm back in Connecticut. Suitcase is unpacked. Job websites are pulled up on the computer. Without the sweet, sweet gentle humidity and heat in the air, my beach-chic hair (read: little bit of product on towel dried hair, then simply let air dry, which should happen in about 1/2 hour) just ain't happening. My tan's still there but I know it's fading by the day, and combined with the aforementioned absence of beach-chic hair plus a drastic wardrobe change (from sundresses to...ugh, pants and close-toed shoes), so is my ease of getting ready to go anywhere.
Can you really return from living a dream and find happiness in desk jobs and cold weather? Let's see how this goes...
