December 12 - Dec. 16.

The Scene:
Me in my long black puffy coat with giant backpack on my back; yoga mat strapped to it and all, giant duffle bag at my feet along with two bags in my hands, standing in front of the customs officer-lady.

Customs Officer: How long where you in Canada?
Me: About 10 days.
CO: What were you doing there?
Me: Visiting friends
CO: How do you know these friends?
Me: I used to work in Northern Ontario at a camp in the summers, and I know them from that job, we worked there together.
CO: And where are you going?
Me: Back to Chicago.
CO: Where do you live?
Me: Outside Chicago, the suburbs.
CO: And what do you do there?
Me: I’m currently unemployed.



Sitting in the back of a cab at 5 a.m. going from bus station to train station:
Cabbie: So you moving or something?
Me: Yes.
Cabbie: Where you coming from?
Me: Toronto
Cabbie: Toronto, huh? How long where you there?
Me: I’ve been gone about a month
Cabbie: A month? That’s nothing, that’s a vacation!
Me: Yeah, I know.




I’ve been back in Chicago for a couple days now. It has taken some adjusting. One major adjustment was moving back into my parent’s house. Even bigger was moving back into the basement.
It’s hard not to feel a little deja-vu coming back here. The last time I lived in this room, I had just graduated college. I was unemployed – then working two part time jobs, I was looking into graduate school for library science (just as I am now).

I know, I know, I can’t discount the past three years. But I can’t help but feel like I’m back where I started. Granted, the last time I lived in this room I also fell in love - and trust me, ain’t been easy dispelling those ghosts from this place - and found a job that I stayed at for two years. So, for being a starting point, it has workded out for me before. So, a trip to Ikeas and two days later, I’ve got my little corner, my little plot of land, a place in the world.

Another adjustment is to being unemployed. Being unemployed and being back in my parent’s basement, well, I’ve had to watch myself to keep depression at bay. Again – adjustment, and acceptance. And just trying to “be here now”. It ain’t easy for me.
If nothing else this whole experience is teaching me a lot about myself.

I need a reason for everything. (Ohh, self realization #3,408,621: Probably a contributing factor in how difficult seems to be to get over the ex-boyfriend. Sure, there were lots of reasons, but in the end – it just didn’t work. And the fact that love can just fade like that: very, very hard to accept). I need to have reasons for why this happens, for why that happens. And finding the greater “life-lessons” to bring to my current unemployment and living situation, to give it meaning, is very hard to see this close up to it.

So, I do yoga.
I run.
And I am trying my best to just put my head on my desk and take a minute.