Why Leave?

Tomorrow, I’m heading to China. I’ll be teaching English to high schoolers in Chongqing, the biggest city you’ve never heard of, for a year or maybe two.

It still hasn’t sunk in yet.

I’m not sure it will until I’m on the plane, or landing in Beijing for training, or maybe a few months after settling in.

I had all summer to prepare, to get excited, to daydream, but I could never manage to get myself to worry. That was a little worrying in and of itself; was I missing something? I’ve been trying to find a concrete reason for this calmness, what part of me feels is undeserved.

How could be I be so calm leaving everything I knew behind?

Why leave?

Am I running away? Saying good riddance? Trying to relive study abroad memories? Sincerely pursuing an exciting career?

At this point, a wise person — or college sophomore figuring out which answers the professor likes best — would say, “All four,” but those sort of answers always seemed too easy or too boring to me. And in my case, I really don’t think the first three are correct.

I don’t feel I’m running away because the steps I’ll be taking in China are something proactive in the development of my career, skills, and person. I’m not ashamed of being American and I accept the responsibilities that come with it. I intend to vote. From what I hear and read from expats, distance makes the heart grow fonder, even for commonwealths.

And yet, perhaps I do sometimes indulge in feeling frustrated with the United States.

What am I supposed to feel after spending two months visiting friends of mine who are working two or three or even four jobs trying to make ends meet? That’s not a statistic for me. That’s not separate from other political realities, either.

Sometimes I feel like I should feel bitter out of a sense of justice. Other times I feel stupid, cut off from what’s really going on. And that’s not even getting into the controversial stuff; it’s an anxious time to be American these days.

That anxiety, which comes from giving a damn, won’t go away while I’m in China — and I don’t think it should.

But none of that is why I’m going to China. That’s not why I went to study in Kunming a year and a half ago. That’s not why I see myself working and living East or Southeast Asia in my future.

As soon as I was on the plane going to China the first time, I knew I was going to come back. Not even that I wanted to or would get around to it one day. It was going to happen, and soon.

It hasn’t sunk in yet because it wasn’t a terrifying choice for me. It seemed like the next logical step, a no-brainer, like how it felt to go back to campus after a summer of resting.

Preordained, but from a secret, personal source of destiny, not the whims of others.

I fell in love with China like how I fell in love with journalism. It just sort of happened. Or rather, it happened in the middle of things.

But wait, isn’t your story of achievement and growth supposed to begin with your dreams since childhood?

The honest-to-God reason why I pursued these vocations was simply that I had an opportunity to pursue them. The love grew thereafter.

I think there is a larger-than-expected portion of young professionals who pursue what they pursue because the opportunity is there. Nothing more, nothing less. The justification, aspirations and philosophies come later.

In other words, they choose a pretty good option and end up falling in love with it as they go along.

If this sounds depressingly fatalistic or fraudulent, it’s because we’ve been told to think so.

Inspirational speeches want to present their inspiring narrative in a neat package. That’s not a bad thing at all, and they’re probably telling the truth. And I’m sure that you, just as I do, know plenty of people, young or experienced, who have always known what they want to be since childhood, and they will become the inspirational speakers for the next generation. They are amazing and I’m glad to have met the ones I have.

But if you didn’t have that experience, what are you supposed to do? Lie to yourself? Feel mediocre? I don’t think so.

There’s something to be said for the unexpected beauty of a passion one discovers only after taking the plunge.