Bring it on, 2010!

As I peruse Facebook tonight, it seems everyone is asking “where were you 10 years ago?” as we prepare to enter 2010 in four short hours. As I’m too chatty to sum up where I was in a simple status update, I thought it was the perfect question to entice me back to my blog. Oh dear blog, I’ve neglected you and my project to be more spontaneous. To be fair, I have done some mildly spontaneous things in the last few months (more on that later); I just haven’t written about them. But, back to the question: I can remember exactly what I was thinking about 10 years ago, about to embark on a grand adventure that I didn’t know was coming. New Year’s Eve, 1999, I was living with my parents, working at my hometown weekly newspaper. My dad and I were enjoying our latest projects: making mix CDs using these new things called MP3s, which we could download to our computer and burn onto CDs using Nero. (Actually, I think we may have downloaded WAV files and then converted them to MP3s–any geek historians out there remember?) I remember loving Will Smith’s Will2K song and thinking all this Y2K stuff was just a bunch of hype. A few months before, a guy I had a major crush on and was connecting with announced he was moving across the country with his girlfriend. I grimace at my crush now, feeling pathetic, but at the time, he broke my heart. I had recently studied for and taken my GREs and was accepted into Indiana University’s graduate program. I planned to study something like comparative education or some such, basically looking for something to stimulate my brain, jump start my life and get me on a track to somewhere. Don’t get me wrong, I love my hometown and loved working at the newspaper, but I knew that I would never have a social life, dating life or “real” adult life if I continued to live with my parents and not leave my hometown. I left only to travel and when I would return, I yearned for the social life and all the new 20-something friends I made while traveling. I wasn’t going to find that in Brookville, so heading to IU was my stepping stone.

About a month into the new millenium I was hanging out with my younger brother in his room and I started to talk about how impatient I was for my life to get going. It was only January, and I couldn’t imagine waiting until September to start grad school. What was I going to do during that time? I had planned to move to Washington, DC, after grad school, but I was taking baby steps to get there. What if I skipped school — I hadn’t paid for anything yet and I could always defer enrollment in case I changed my mind — and moved to DC NOW? As I talked to my brother, the idea became rooted. There are certain times in my life when a plan has struck me and I instantly know that it’s the right plan, the immediate plan, the plan I need to focus all my energy (and money) on immediately. I had that feeling when I quit my newspaper job after college to move home with my parents and become a reporter, and later editor, at my hometown newspaper. And I had that feeling one day as a reporter, sitting in another interminable county commissioners’ meeting, that I should quit my job now to travel through Europe again (instead of waiting a year and saving money for an around-the-world trip). I knew that feeling. That feeling was excitement and resolve and certainty, tinged with a little nervousness, but not hesitation. So, in that January 2000, I quit my job, began applying for editing and writing jobs in DC over the Internet and made plans to move. In February, I was in DC to interview for jobs, find an apartment and stay with my good college buddy, Marina, who had been pestering me to move to DC for a few years. By March, I had a new zip code and a new paycheck.

I loved DC from the moment I visited in 1998 and loved it even more when I moved here in 2000. With only one friend in the city, I spent most weekends walking, exploring neighborhoods and learning to navigate the city. (I got in tremendous shape from all that exploring!) I remember my first week on the job I was sent to Capitol Hill to cover a press conference and a few months later, I was sent to the White House to cover an event with the first lady, Hillary Clinton. I loved my new city–everything was happening here and I was surrounded by news. Now, 10 years later, I’m on my fourth job in DC; have had a few relationships and my heart broken; moved away for a year to travel; bought a sofa and a queen-size bed (the first two items that made me feel like I was an adult and had put down roots); discovered cell phones, ipods, Macbooks, social media; learned how to cook and bake; cried and ranted about these long, long wars; made new friends and dumped old friends; walked 60 miles in a 3-day breast cancer walk; met a few celebrities and plenty of congressmen; survived 9/11 and cried for days after; traveled to Austin twice, Minnesota, London again, San Francisco a few times, NYC a few times; explored and fell in love with Peru and my great travel partners; cried over New Orleans and Katrina; tried out speed dating, blind dates, Match.com, and finally fell in love with  a guy I met on eharmony; moved in with a guy for the first time; got engaged to that guy in my favorite city, Rome; and married that guy in my beloved hometown (and sang a song at our wedding!).

Now, as Eriq and I sit near each other on our one couch, engrossed in our separate laptops, I look ahead to 2010 and beyond and our life together. I ask first and foremost for health and happiness, but also for a little help with this economic devastation and the effect it’s had on Eriq’s business. I look forward to traveling more with Eriq — I yearn to return to Scotland and show Eriq that wonderful country. I’m wishing to someday move into a condo, townhouse or small home where we’re allowed to have pets. If I could clone my uncle Kevin’s dog, I would, and snag a few kittens from the pound.

As I look back on all that has happened the last 10 years, I acknowledge and appreciate how lucky I’ve been in love, life, work, family and travel. What more could I ask for?

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