In 1992, when all of my classmates were heading off to college, I boarded a plane for Switzerland, by way of New York. I was 17. I well remember arriving at JFK airport hours before my departure was scheduled, and wandering the halls of the terminal, killing time and testing out this new sense of being on my own. I wore a floral culotte jumper so unfortunately popular in that age, a coral blazer, and, inexplicably, Birkenstocks, and carried a brown leather Coach purse; I had chosen this carefully as my armor. When it came time to head to my gate, I made the bewildering discovery that this airport had multiple terminals, and to get to the one I needed I would have to take a bus. I was told to take the red, white and gray bus from the back of the terminal when in fact I required the red, white and blue bus departing from the front. Somehow, I did make the flight, and this small incident with the buses started my journey with the knowledge that I could find my own way.
The thing that lingers with me 16 years later is how everyone told me I was so brave. As if I was going off to Paris to build a life, like the heroine of Sabrina (and countless other coming-of-age tales). In fact, my year in Switzerland was simply a year at school, just like my peers who went off to college and adapted to a variation on the theme they had been living for most of their lives: more school, wherever it may be, is still a familiar structure in which many of us can function with ease. It was living away from home that was significant, not the fact that the place I chose to do it happened to speak another language.
Now again I find people telling me that I am brave. That they wished they had the guts to quit their jobs, whether to spend more time as a parent or to pursue a passion, long-forgotten in the detritus of making ends meet, making the grade, making partner, making it here (to make it anywhere). This time, I won't have a familiar structure to ease into, and all the metaphors for what I am about to do use the cliched language of risk and adventure: taking a big leap, stepping off the cliff, heading into the unknown.
What is so ridiculous is how undramatic the events of this big change actually are. Today I moved my employee file from "current" to "past." I asked our designer to take my photo and bio off the website. I took myself off our bank accounts. I made a laundry list for the new director of operations, who will take on some of my role: I wrote things like "merge HR files" and "manage per-project insurance needs." I deleted thousands of emails with one-word or one-sentence replies.
After nearly 6 years, tomorrow is my last day at Creative Time. On Thursday, Clio and I go to Minnesota for a long weekend. Next Tuesday, I will get up in the morning, and....
This weekend at Jim and Missy's we all took a bunch of personality tests on line. Mine indicated that I am future-oriented, which is exactly the language I use when I struggle to plan for our family--when I complain about what Dave is not. For the past three months, it has been much easier, somehow, to focus on the organization's future without me, instead of my future without it. It's not so much that I feel my identity to be wrapped up in this place (though all the major milestones of my adult life have happened against this backdrop); it's more that in choosing to leave (for parts unknown, to continue the cliches), I am choosing to define my own identity. And from this moment, when it hasn't begun but it feels like so much rides on it, that shouldn't be scary, but it is.
When I was 17, I knew that my trip, while an adventure, was not at all brave. Right now, I have absolutely no idea if I am brave, or crazy, or something else--I just know that something was not working, and it was time for a change. The stakes are high now: three people's livelihoods and happiness are linked to my own, and to the choices I make. Next week, when it starts to settle in a little, I might feel relief, or I might panic. Either way, I will probably make a laundry list for myself. On it I will write such dramatic things as "make new budget," "update resume," "clean toilets," and "potty training!" and I will begin to tackle these things while I look for a way to get started on what comes next.
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