Backward And Forward

There are basically three kinds of people in the world. Those who live in the past, those that live in the future and those who are always in the moment. Then there's me. I seem to be a hybrid of the two that I'd rather not be. I'm either lamenting the days gone by or planning for my next big move even if it might be years away.

Add in a little obsessive-compulsiveness, mix well, and you've pretty much got me.

We all have that friend that lives in the moment, right? Drives you crazy doesn't it? Sure it does. We're jealous as hell. I've tried, I've really tried. I look at my good friend Ray and I just can't believe how in the moment he can be sometimes. Like to the second. This is why he can be so hard to get a hold of and takes too long to return calls. He's just too busy doing what he's doing at the moment. It can be infuriating and admirable all at once. I've always tried to be more like that, but not very successfully.

I'm always wishing for things to be like they were in the past in one form or another. I loved college and still think it was one of the best times of my life. I miss living in Seattle like crazy and I'm always wondering why I left. Though the whole timing of leaving Seattle was kind of perfect. I lived there in the 90s when I was in my twenties, and I left right after the 90s ended and I turned 30. Makes for a nice back story about myself when I meet new people.

I'm sure that if you asked people who knew me when I was in college or in Seattle they would not tell you that I was a guy who seemed totally content and happy with where he was. They would probably tell you that I was always bitching about wanting to go somewhere else. Though I'm not sure.

Of course I'm not always looking back. I seem to always be looking for my next move. Those who remember all of my writing while I was living Boston know that for three years I was jonesing to get the hell out of there. Heck, I was even told my wife that if she took a job at the Mayo Clinic that I would be OK with that, even though it is in the middle of Nowhere Minnesota. So my obsession with getting out of Boston was just because no sane person want to stay there.

But now I live in New York. This is one of the greatest cities in the world and I totally love living here. But I still can't help but start looking at what our next move will be. And I'm already trying to influence the decision. I've been talking the town up lately, kind of just laying the thought in her head as a primer for a future date.

My wife's job basically dictates where we live, being the one with the real career and all. Since she has basically said she doesn't think she'd be able to get a doctor job in another country, I've had to, regretfully, make myself give up on my dream of living outside of America.

But since we know her job here is not a permanent one it means that we will be considering another move in a few years. Of course I'm already obsessing about it.

We have a very limited list of cities we are willing to live in. In the States anyway. Add Europe to the equation and it would be a lot longer, but I'm working with our realistic options.

For some reason I've become really enamored with the idea of Portland Oregon being our next city. I don't really know why, except that I always like moving to cities that I've never lived. I really love exploring new towns. I've been to Portland a few times and I just love it there. Great music scene, good weather, nice people, close to mountains and outdoor stuff, micro brews and, something very important to me, one of the only real good public transportation systems west of the Mississippi. Plus, since we're probably going to breed at some point, it would be a great place to raise a kid.

And it seems that Portland keeps coming up in things I read lately, including the travel section of last Sunday's New York Times and my last issue of Trains magazine. And one of my favorite songs in the last couple of years is Portland Oregon by Loretta Lynn with Jack White. So it's like a sign, if I actually believed in that nonsense.

I've been planting the idea in my wife's head as much as I can lately, trying to put in early influence for when she has to start looking for a job again. I've even looked up transit maps online to see what neighborhoods we would be looking at based on which ones the light rail lines go through. Though that probably has as much to do with my map and transit geekiness as it does my planning the future. I've spent hours looking at maps of the London Underground, Paris Metro, Metro Roma, Metro Madrid, even the St. Louis and Denver light rail lines. I don't expect to end up living in any of those places.

Don't get me wrong, if given the chance I would go to London or Rome in a heartbeat. It just ain't gonna happen.

So I'm resigned to ponder where we'll end up next, and hope that maybe it could be as cool as someplace like Portland.

But damn, I'm going to living in New York, a place where I've always wanted to live, for at least a couple more years. Why can't I just enjoy it and stop planning my next move?