I have a legitimate reason in working two jobs on Fridays at the moment, and with a busy deadline week at the paper, my mind happened to be elsewhere for most of the day.
It happens and it's far from a bad thing considering the alternative. That said, onward to the meat of the argument.
I've been in this part of the world nearly 25 years now, and every year I've told myself it was the year I would leave the oft-rainy Pacific Northwest and Portland, in particular, for somewhere "bigger and better." Now having been here nigh on a quarter-century, one would think I've grown attached to this little city with a ton of bridges and 250 days of precipitation.
And I have in many ways. As much as I call Boston my home and always will, it's not that I entirely hate Portland either. For it's size, there's fun places to go, it doesn't seem too imposing like mega-cities like Chicago, which frankly scared the heck out of me when I was last there six years ago. There's also the beach out the west, the mountains to the east, and for the most part, the people are as weird as the city touts them to be.
That's also not to suggest that I'm solely looking at the northeast as the only place I want to go back to. I'll admit that if I got a phone call tomorrow saying I could go back, have a career that I want and live in New England again, I would seriously consider it. But having seen other cities in this country too, I've been thinking a change of scenery would be a positive thing for me.
Because the problem is being in a city that while I like it, it has so many things that I'd be better served to forget.
As children, we have a natural tendency to leave where we grew up and not go back. Often that choice is voluntary. You go off to college, get a new job, start a career, etc., and that entails finding a new place to settle down. When the choice is not yours to make, however, it makes the desire to get back to where you're comfortable and in familiar surroundings.
I didn't have a say in coming to Portland. I got put on a plane with a ticket and that was that. 3,094 miles later and I was the proverbial Stranger in a Strange Land, and while I can honestly say I grew up here, met some truly great people and saw some amazing things in this city, a lot of those memories are tainted now.
So I've been looking at jobs in other cities like Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, Maine, and even in states I haven't been to before like Minnesota, Vermont, Colorado, and even New York. Will they pan out? I have no idea, and even if they do, I still need to convince myself that it's the right move for me.
After all, pretty much everyone and everything I know is still in this part of the world. Even though it might do me a lot of good to get a new start to my life somewhere else, I'm also realistic enough to know it won't help me by going somewhere that will make me take a step back, rather than keep moving forward.
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