One foot in front of the other

When I was a child, I used to run all the time. My favorite thing to do was run up and down the sidewalks that lined my street. I would run. I never jogged, I never walked. I only, always ran.

I even enjoyed the ache in my lungs when I pushed myself too hard, ran too fast.

But I don’t do that anymore. I don’t run.

As I write this, I am sitting at Copley Place in Boston. This is the kiosk that I was asked to apply, and as far as I know, have been hired to manage.

Morale is low, sales are low, and nothing is organized.

Enter Patti. I can organize an office space/kiosk in a day. I can boost morale. I can sell, train, retrain and rethink.

But I don’t want to.

The base pay is the same as in Danbury. The health benefits, the hours, the product… everything is the same.

It’s the same boring job, just somewhere new. So why then, should I move?

That, I believe, is a logical argument.

So why do I feel so miserable to make it?

I made lists of pros and cons: Danbury vs. Boston. Each time, they pretty much tied. One thing would cancel out another.

I don’t pay rent in Danbury, like I would have to in Boston.

Boston has a mass transit system, a good one and I could ditch my car and the insurance premiums, high gas prices and property taxes.

The Boston location is a bigger, better one than mine in Danbury. The possibility for more money is there, but I would have higher expenses. Rent, food, utilities… It adds up.

I have close friends in both cities. Laura is in Boston. I would love to live nearer to her.

But in the end, I don’t want to do it. It’s not that I can’t. I can. But I don’t want to. And if the situation is the same no matter where I go, why should I?

I can’t help wondering what my father would think. Would he be supportive? Or would he remember that I cried about HAVING to pass this up just a few weeks ago, because the money was better where I was?
“I thought you wanted to be in Boston. And the money might be better. You should go.”

Maybe I’m a freak. Maybe I am one of the apparent handful of people in this world who would rather struggle financially doing something I love than coast by on a million dollar paycheck forcing myself to go to work everyday.

When I decided to take the manager job in Danbury, it was hard. But my father said “You can take the pain now, or you can take it later. But you’re going to have to take it. The longer you put it off, the more it’s going to hurt.”

I agree. So why relocate to feel pain when I can stay where I am and feel it? I’ll probably feel it worse in Danbury.

And I don’t care.

I don’t want this. I know myself well enough to know that if I honestly don’t want to do something, I won’t do it. I’ll go through the motions well enough, for a while. But I will quickly burn out. I don’t want that.

So I am choosing to walk away from what could be a great opportunity because I know that I am not willing to fully pursue it.

I am walking away. I am calm and clear. I am not running.