Motherly Love

Naturally, my parents had very different reactions when I told them of my plans to move. Unsurprisingly, the parent 1,000 miles away was totally cool with the idea. The one a 30-minute drive down the road was slightly less than excited to be losing me to the other West Coast.

Saying that I’m lucky is an understatement. To have parentals who are completely supportive of my plans to move is an amazing gift from them both. I mean, at 25 I can do whatever I want. But still, support feels great. With regards to my mother, “supportive” is an understatement.  About a week after the bomb drop, she came back and shocked me with the desire to make the drive with me.

My initial reaction- “hell no.” (I didn’t actually say that). 

Second reaction- “I don’t need my MOM to drive with me. I’m not a freshman moving into my dorm room.” (I did actually say that, not nice).

Third reaction- “Mom, I drive a Mini Cooper…you’d take up, like, a third of my packing space.” (Ok, more reasonable and actually logical).

The real reason I had such a visceral reaction was because- I’m supposed to be doing this on my own. That’s how I’ve planned it. Just me. On the open road! How fun! Winding my way across the country. Stopping at sketchy hotels because of my limited budget. Seeing the crazy people who stay at these sketchy hotels. Being paranoid by myself at night thinking about that sketchy guy I saw when I checked into the sketchy hotel. Wondering if he saw the number on my room key and wishing I had a gun…

Ok, maybe it would be cool if my mom came along.

“Why?”

“I’m moving to California.”  Saying that to someone for the first time is very weird. Planning to do something is one thing, telling people what you’re doing seals your fate in concrete.

I loved planting the seed in my friends and waiting for the reactions to grow… “What? You’re moving to Cali?!”  “No, way! Congrats.” Then usually: “I am sooo coming to visit!”  Or my favorite: “That’s where you belong!” - Yes, I agree.

The worst response is “Why?”

I would always grapple with an answer and invariably change the subject to some random event I will be missing after my departure.

Example:

“Why do you want to move?” asks friend.

“Uh, because well, you know…Oh dang! I will be missing going to that (enter event here) since I’ll be gone. You have to tell me all about it!” This was always a fantastic deflection because the other person completely forgets their initial “why” question.

But I never did. “Why am I dropping everything and moving?”

Every answer seemed inadequate- “because I want an adventure!” Lame.

“I’ve always wanted to move to CA.” So, why now?

“Because I’m tired of Florida.”  No way. Let’s be honest, I love that state.

So what’s the answer? The past few weeks have left me plenty of time to reflect. Turns out; that “treading-water” feeling creeping up inside of me was actually the opportunity to take life by the horns slipping away. Pretty soon I was going to be making some serious commitments to people (relationships, mortgages, job responsibilities, etc) that were not going to allow me to pick up and leave. My subconscious was screaming at the top of its lungs.

I could feel my freedom slipping, the option to do whatever I wanted fading out of my life. The tide was rising and my anchor became heavier by the minute. Thus, it was time to move on.

  

Letter of Farewell

Just for fun- This was my farewell letter to my friends and coworkers that I sent out on the last day at my job. 

Dear Friends,

As most of you might have ‘Heard it Through the Grapevine’, today is my last day as an EMR Specialist with Nextech.  Most of my life I have been ‘California Dreaming’ and finally have decided to take Ray Charles’ advice to ‘Hit the Road, Jack’ and move to the West Coast this fall.   Please consider this to be my farewell to each and every one of you.

I feel compelled to tell you my feelings are mixed as I leave this chapter of my life. Continually asking myself; ‘Should I Stay or Should I Go’?  As excited as I am about the future, my heart burns with the loss of so many wonderful co-workers and colleagues, many of whom I am sure will remain friends for a long time.  My personal and professional growth these past two years has been nurtured from my time with each of you.  I would be lucky if my future endeavors give me such rewarding experiences and supportive relationships as Nextech has.

Thank you for making my time here a truly enjoyable one. As I check into ‘Hotel California’ I ask anyone who would like to keep in touch moving forward to contact me any time using my personal email: dkarangelen@gmail.com.

My very best wishes go out to all of you,

Dana Karangelen

Quarter Life Crisis

You know that moment first thing on Monday when you have a mental scramble to remember something fun you did over the weekend so you don’t sound like a bum to your coworkers? Yup, that happened to me for about 12 months straight.  Except this one Monday in July I literally could not think of ANYTHING I did all weekend (no, not due to copious amounts of drugs-thank you very much) but because I spent the entire weekend dreading Monday.


 That’s when I realized it- my life had hit the proverbial wall.


Yes, I do understand at 24 your life doesn’t hit squat compared to you people in your thirties and forties. And fifties? Forget it- you have way more to stress about than I do- KIDS? Hell no. Careers, significant others, and aging parents? Forget that! Me? I didn’t even have a goldfish. But that was my problem: I didn’t have ANYTHING to worry about.


No risk. My job was steady at a growing company, I had a great apartment on the beach, awesome friends, and no debt. Sounds pretty fabulous, right?  WRONG. I realized I was just a sitting duck waiting to be scared out of the bushes and shot.

Ok, ok. That sounds disturbing- The metaphor that I’m trying to get here is:
I’m the duck (duh).
The Shot Pellets- a monotonous life.
The Bushes- my carefree 20’s that will whither and die no matter how much MiracleGro I dump on them.
The shooter- The MAN?
The extremely cute black lab retriever who delivers me to The Man- No clue what that signifies, I just like adorable black labs.


Back to the duck problem- so there I was, sitting around, growing plump (yes, desk jobs do that to you) doing nothing with myself. I was letting life pass me by and not trying anything new (except for the occasional microbrewery, they’re popping up all over the Tampa Bay area. FYI- I love Cigar City, but RAPP Brewing’s porter is bomb, and Saint Somewhere rocks. Their tasting room opens whenever they feel like it so go check it out and hope you get lucky).


Again- I digress. So what do you do when life is smooth sailing without a cloud in sight? You call Poseidon and tell him he looks like a monkey’s butt. Or in my case- put my two weeks notice in at work and flip life upside down, dropping everything to figure out how to move to California.

The Quarter Life Crisis has commenced!