I am in a funking funk.
I kinda touched on that in my last post but, well, not really.
I don't think I really
Here it is, the numero uno, top-of-the-funk-list, funk inspirer : I miss New Jersey.
Has anyone in the history of the United States ever actually said that before?
New Jersey, my wonderful home state (that's right - I said wonderful), o how I miss thee.
We moved to Marylfunk (Maryland) a year ago and I put on my biggest,
Moving to MD was not a plan; it was a desperation move.
When you don't have a job because the industry you work in imploded during the recession, you go where someone is offering you one.
So we loaded up the truck and we moved to Marylee.
Unloading and unpacking took many days but on the seventh day we ended our work and looked around at all we had begotten...and it was good.
Or so it seemed.
What you notice, first thing, about Maryland is that it's very pretty here. Lots of open space and farms and more open space and then some more farms...pretty pretty pretty.
Then you start looking for ways to get a feel for your new 'hood and you start getting this uneasy feeling as you try to squash the voice in your head that keeps saying, "Well, there has to be more to this place than just this, right? I mean, it's got to be that I'm just not looking in the right place(s)."
And then many months pass and you're exhausted from trying to find those right places because they don't funking exist.
OK, that's not fair, nor is it exactly entirely true. There are some cool places...
too bad it seems like a whole lot of them are infested with crime.
And I'm not talking about the someone-threw-an-egg-at-the-neighbor's-car kinda crime.
10 out of a possible 10 for violent crime. Yeah, think I'll go take a stroll there later.
Not.
Anyway, even though I could turn this post into a full-out, spot-on diatribe against the state of Maryland based on my personal experience/perspective/opinion, I won't. At least not in this post. ;-)
For those of you who love it here in Marylfunk - and there are tons of you - I sincerely feel glad for you that you feel so much pride about your home.
That is exactly how I feel about New Jersey.
And if you love Marylfunk you would be none too happy about finding yourself living in NJ.
I am a
I mean that literally. For many years I lived a mile or so from the ocean and now I don't live anywhere near the ocean...but I've got the stupid bay in its place and I think I'm supposed to be happy about that. Except I'm not.
If you're not a coastal person you'll have to trust me when I say that the bay ain't the ocean.
The ocean was my church; it's where I went when I was happy, sad, confused, introspective, healthy, unhealthy, lonely, in love, despondent, elated, etc. I went to it with my questions and I left with either the answers I needed or the assurance that the answers would come eventually. I went to it during nor'easters and hurricanes to watch with my own eyes and feel its power and force.
The ocean never once failed to soothe me.
I fear that I will never have that again and that my obituary will read "she spent her latter years in despair at the tremendous loss of not living near her beloved ocean".
It's like this:
- Heart beating- enabled
- Lungs breathing - enabled
- Neurons firing - enabled
- Ocean life force - disabled
I have not gone for a long walk by myself in a year.
Yes, of course I want to move back.
But, of course too, it's not that easy. Is it ever?
My husband has a good job and it's one that he very much likes. He's happy. I think that means that by default I'm supposed to be happy, too, but it's not working out that way and that makes me feel guilty on top of all the other things I'm feeling.
He says, kindly, "let's move back" and I would do that in a funking second ...if the Job Fairy could be summoned in an instant if I click my heels three times.
Ask him to leave a job he likes and to put his own happiness second to mine? Can't do it.
But then what about my own happiness? I'm not very good at being a martyr.
We've even talked about me living there and him living here and coming together on the weekends...as if that's any way to be a happily married couple.
If there is a happy medium in this conundrum, I can't figure out what it is.
If only I had the ocean to help and soothe me.
