It's been a while...

So it's been two weeks since I posted on this fledgling blog. Oh well. My excuse was that I was busy preparing for my trip, but it was really that I was feeling lost, depressed, and wholly uninspired. To be honest, that's been the general feeling for the last year or so, with a couple of random spurts of optomism.

It's been a rough year, and I've allowed the 'woe is me' feeling to penetrate and take over my life. There's really no excuse for that; I've never done it before, I'm not going to let it happen again, and the only reason why I let it happen is because it seemed like an almost acceptable time to let it happen. Thinking I had emerged from it a few months ago, I pressed on more seriously in the job hunt but have ultimately failed thus far because I lacked any sort of aim or passion.

Amsterdam completely changed this. I had never been to Europe, had only been out of the country once (rural Costa Rica, you should go), but Amsterdam just felt perfect. It is a beautiful city that is clean, organized, quiet, artistic, industrious, and just the right size. There is no traffic because there are no cars, just on-time-to-the-second public transit and more bikes than I've ever seen. The people are incredible: bluntly honest, thoughtful, very friendly, and extremely cultured. Quite honestly, it is my idea of the utopian city: the small but bustling center of a wealthy socialist country.

What got to me is that I immediately started imagining living there, and my priorities instantly shifted. My career goals were simply to be challenged while contributing to the success of the city, such that I could enjoy the government controlled 9 hour maximum work days, 20-25 days of vacation, and mandatory 8% bonus. To eat simple, organic meals of fresh bread, dutch cheese, beautiful vegetables, and great beer; to ride my bike EVERYWHERE, to walk with Nick and Elvis in Vondel Park in the evenings, to take weekend excursions to Brussels, Rotterdam, Paris.....

I've come home refreshed, knowing that life does not revolve around what you do from 9-5 (or 8-7, or whatever). Life is about feeling good about what you do during that time, and using your success during that time to enjoy your free time with the people and things you love, in a place that you love. I'm sure this sounds a little half-baked and dreamy, but this is quite a profound moment for this lost little puppy. So now, I say, bring on the job offers (which, amazingly, started to actualize themselves while I was gone). Bring out the boxes to pack my piles of books. Craigslist buyers, come get my furniture. And off to San Francisco (or Holland, or Singapore, or Atlanta, or...?) I go...