More Choices

So much to do, so many choices, and only so much time and money. Maybe it’s too early to think about any or all of this stuff, but I honestly can’t help it. So here are some things I’ve been considering, listed from largest-scale/immediacy to least important…

Where do I want to spend this summer? It seems like so many high school friends are going to be away this summer. There are so many places to travel and maybe this would be a good time to travel and live somewhere else. I’m thinking maybe San Francisco. I don’t know much — except that it’s a nice place: it has a great lindy scene, and I could probably pull in some decent cash. But there will still be people here that I enjoy at home. I really like working in Cambridge. And then a bunch of high school friends are going to be in DC, where I already know the area. But I don’t think I want to be there in the summer…. It would be a lot of work to go off to California, but I think I could pull it off. And Dave (from work) might look into doing the trip with me. I just need to do more research…

What do I want to do when I get out of college? Yeah, I’m sure I’ll be asking myself this quite a few times more in the next year and a half. But really, this is actually more like the last question just on a larger scale. I want to go abroad and live in Spain, for maybe a year or two. Yeah, I could *tour* there for a few months, but I’d much rather work and really live in the culture. And of course I’d get to travel all around. I’d see another world of art, architecture, conversation, dance, humor, food, technology, values, work… But I don’t know that I’d want to leave for that long. Somewhere inside me wants me to live in Cambridge and love my twenties in what seems like the intellectual capital for my generation…and a beautiful place. But anyone that knows me well knows that all these are dependent on one thing: people. Everyone tells me to get up and go, and I do, but I don’t leave. And quite honestly I’m afraid of loving all these other places: San Francisco, Madrid, Washington DC, Cambridge, Framingham… they are all such great places with amazing people, with told and untold stories alike. And then who knows where love will take me? Hopefully not away from my dreams. But there’s just so much to consider, so much that can’t be considered, so much that doesn’t seem to make a difference when making these arbitrary decisions that form the path of our life.

It’s not always big questions, either. I love photography, I’ve been going through 10-15 pictures per week. And it’s going to take me a year to scan all these and put them where I want them? So do I shell out the cash and get a digital camera? Or is not even an alternative if you want to take quality pictures. I don’t know… I want to work out, do I work next door to my work at the close gym, a few blocks away at the nice gym, or near my house at another gym? New Year’s is coming up, do I spend it with the tried and true friends that have no idea what to do or spend it with the dancers that always plan things months in advance? I feel like it’s all just a game of which ties one cuts; they all say it’s not that important, but it is to me. And damnit, shouldn’t it be important to them, too?

Read I Got This Old In An hour by Mike Hirsch. Or at least read an article or two of his. Why do I say this? Because I’m reading it right now? Yes, but also because in his world it doesn’t seem like things were as complex. And yet they weren’t simple. I wonder what it would be like to live 60 years ago. I don’t think I’d be asking any of these questions. That’s enough tangents for today. Make movies.

About this entry

You’re currently reading “More Choices,” an entry on Dancingwithwords.com

Published:
12.21.00 / 6pm
Category:
Reflections
Add this article to Digg, Del.icio.us, or Ma.gnolia.