Surprise!

 

 Surprise! We're moving! 

I know. I can hardly believe it myself even as our house is in the midst of organized chaos. Boxes everywhere!

How did this happen, you ask. Well, let me tell you.

For as long as I've lived in Kansas, (13 years? more or less) I've been at the very least semi-discontented. I never was supposed to be here for very long. This was a temporary side quest after I got back from South Africa in 2010. But surprise! It wasn't actually a side quest at all. It was the full adventure. It was my home for more than a decade. It's where I met and feel in love with my husband. It's were I got my foot in the door at MCC. It's where I met a lot of great people. It's where the cost of living is so cheap. (We will miss that for sure). Kansas was exactly what I needed when I got back from Pietermaritzburg and I will be forever grateful for that.

And yet after the years kept passing. Temperatures in the summer kept getting hotter and hotter and I grew more and more restless. Then the pandemic hit, I started working from home and really resenting living so far from our families. Levent and I started having more serious conversations about moving, although we didn't really know how to make the jump or even where we should move. 

After we got home from Blake and Brendan's wedding last summer, we had another conversation where I asked Levent if he would be open to the idea of moving to Columbus. His family (in the States) lives there, I have family and connections in the area and it's significantly closer to Illinois and Virginia where my family is. It seemed like a good place to transition to. But, at the time, it felt like that conversation wasn't going anywhere. Regardless, it was at least a start and a more concrete idea than any other. 

Fast forward to our Japan trip. We got home and both were struggling with feeling discontent (more so than the regular feelings once you get back from an amazing and long vacation). I was struggling with coming back to Kansas when there are way cooler and more populated areas out there to explore. And Levent was struggling with going back to work at Sherwin Williams (although I didn't really know that yet. He is such an internal processor). 

About two weeks after we got back, we had another conversation that started off with me crying because I didn't know how to talk about moving. It was also the conversation where I mentioned that my Kansas drivers license expires in 2024 and that I wanted to use that as a deadline to move. (I often need external deadlines in my life to motivate me). 

But turns out, Levent was ready to quit his job. Surprise! I thought maybe this meant in 2024 (re the deadline), but nope. He meant in May/June. Seeing that it was April at the time, this was a really big shock. I didn't know that he had gotten to his wit's end. But I was proud of him for knowing his own mind and for being ready to take the leap out of that taxing job. Not only that, he was ready to move to Columbus. We could live in his parent's basement apartment for awhile and figure things out. And girl, I was ready! Let's do this.

So Levent turned in his notice and his last day was June 2. I got permission to continue working remotely, but just from Ohio this time. And we started slowly making all the necessarily steps to move.

We are now a week out from packing up the U-Haul and moving our entire lives to Columbus. And I am in my feelings. I am excited and sad. Nervous and optimistic. I can't wait to live in a city but also will miss all the physical space Kansas has to offer (especially when driving). I can't wait to be near the Millers and be part of family dinners, but I will also deeply miss my community here, especially my cousin Heidi. I will miss all the prairie sunshine, but am excited to be back (in what I consider) in the Midwest proper. It's all of the things. Plus the dreaded task of sorting through everything we own and putting it into boxes. 

It's a liminal space, but I am grateful to be here at last.

Surprise!