A Jumble of Thoughts & A Potential First Blog Post

They don’t lie when they say that time flies. It really does.

If someone asked me when I graduated high school in June 2013, where I would see myself in three years, I would have said still in New York City, of course. I’d be living the life of a young adult in one of the greatest cities in the world on the verge of graduating college. An intern at CNN or NBC, with high hopes of being offered a job after graduating in 2017. Three years and one month later, things are drastically different.

I’m now a resident of Houston, Texas, a senior in college on course to be an educator and enter the world of academics. How did I get here? Is this where I plan to stay? What about my “dreams” of living the life in NYC?

The truth is, I don’t know. After being in NYC for three years, things changed and more importantly, I changed. I don’t regret my time in the city, it taught me a lot and was a real life experience for me and I don’t write off ever being a New Yorker again. But you have to love New York in order to get the most out of it and my love for the city was running low (while my love for London was growing).

What I think I realized was that rather than devote time, money, and effort to survive in New York City (because that’s what most people do) I’d rather live in a different place, still a major city, but one that doesn’t require the same kind of constant grind one must have to live in New York. I also realized that I don’t want to stay in one place. I want to travel the world and see the globe. Not just to travel, but to live as well. I want to sail through the fjords of Scandinavia, teach the masses of young people in Asia, go swimming in the Dead Sea, visit the few kingdoms left in the world, and even be one of the few to get to Antarctica if the chance ever came.

This I know. My desire to travel is certain. Of course with caution, but still a certainty. Almost everything else about life, I don’t know. I couldn’t even say I am 100% sure of what I want to be. Is that bad? Shouldn’t I have these things figured out by now? Well, I don’t necessarily look at it as a bad thing. I have goals, as we all should, and that goal right now is to become a teacher and share my knowledge with young people. But while I say that, in my head I’d also like to be a flight attendant, a journalist, a historian, a politician, and so many other things. And while I’m taking the path to become a teacher, I say to myself that I’m also going to take whatever comes my way. There’s no reason to stay stuck in one particular place and position forever, even though we usually become comfortable in a certain niche and doing whatever it is we’re good at. But my point is, I don’t think it’s necessarily bad as young people to not know what we want to do. We have 60–70 years ahead of us. We don’t have to plan all those decades right now. It’s important to strive for the goals we set ourselves, but as we achieve them or as the goals change, we change and set new ones. And if the goals get bigger, our strive should get stronger and we shouldn’t shy away from new opportunities. From a song in one of my favorite musicals, Into the Woods: Opportunity is not a lengthy visitor.

That being said, Houston was an opportunity and I took it. To start anew seems daunting, but so are many other things in life. After a month in Texas’s largest city, I can say one thing: It’s hot. They don’t lie about that. Beyond that, I find it exciting to be in a new city, even if it’s impossible to step outside without perspiring. It’s different than what I’m used to, yes. But we’re humans and adaptable. There are no subway trains. No yellow cabs. People drive heavy-duty pick up trucks. Highways and interstates are the paths to get around. Dark clouds often take over a sunny sky and bring about my fears of flooding that Houston is known for. The Texas State Flag flies high and proud, and you can find the Lone Star almost everywhere. Texans are a proud people, and for the foreseeable future, I suppose I’m one of those people.

Now Houston isn’t London, where I would love to be most of all, but it’s another city I get to put on my map and that’s enough for me. Each place is different. Each has different experiences. Each has adventures to be taken. And here’s to the adventures Houston will take me on.

Until next time, y’all,

TTT

P.S. Is this the first post of a blog? We’ll see. Blogging takes dedication, and photography is easier, so we’ll see.