A new adventure

Well, I made it. I'm sitting in a Starbucks in Greenbelt, Maryland, enjoying the air conditioning (did I move to the East Coast or the tropics?) and the free internet (mine won't be hooked up until next Friday). My new apartment was a pleasant surprise. You can tell it's an old building that's just gotten a face-lift, but it's clean and much more spacious than I was expecting. I've spent the past few days buying things to fill it up (thoughts after first IKEA experience: prices were right, stuff was easy to assemble, but finding what I wanted in that crowded maze of merchandise wasn't my idea of fun).

Moving in proved easy (for me anyway) thanks to my friend Tim and his brother Mike. Mike lives in the D.C. area and Tim drove with me from Minnesota, which was no small favor (we both agreed that we'd never hack it as long-haul truckers). The two of them had most of my stuff out of the vehicles and into the apartment before I'd finished filling out the paperwork.

So really I have had very little to worry about — except for the whole "complete life change" thing. There's certainly been moments of doubt on that front. The night before I left St. Cloud I sat awake wondering "What am I doing? What am I doing? What am I doing?" I was leaving my family and most of my friends to move across the country and start school again just one short year away from my 30th birthday. The safer play seemed like staying home with mom and dad and sticking it out at the St. Cloud Times until a full-time position opened up.

But something happened on the drive out here that reminded me of why I'm doing this in the first place: I listened to "The Alchemist" on audiobook. Odd how that happened, really. As I was packing up my stuff I came across the 4-CD set, which I had never listened to. It was a gift from a long-lost friend (Elizabeth, who's off working for the parks system somewhere, probably dodging bears) years earlier. I had no idea what the book was about, but I figured a 20-hour drive to D.C. was the perfect time to give it a listen.

God's hand was in there somewhere. The story is about a young Spanish shepherd who has a dream about a treasure buried near the Egyptian pyramids. He chucks aside his safe, familiar life to trek across the Sahara after this treasure for years, learning new trades and falling in love along the way, but never losing sight of the ultimate goal. The book was all about fulfilling your "personal legend," even when life tries to beat it out of you. It was just what I needed to hear.

I believe in my talent. I believe in my drive. I believe in my personal legend. I believe that this next year will help me make it a reality.