One month.

One month from today, I'm packing up my worldly goods and heading down I-5 to begin a new season.

It's beginning to feel very real.

It's so good and so exciting!  I absolutely cannot wait for a new pace of life, a new way of being.  There will be things I've missed - like books and discussions and OED access.  For the first time, I will be living alone.  And, since I'll be an Oregonian, there will be no sales tax and no pumping gas for 2 whole years.  I'm trading the corporate for a classroom and a bus commute for a 5 minute bicycle ride.  It's not going to be like undergrad and it's not going to be like working full time.  It's going to be wonderfully new!

At the same time, I'm leaving dear friends--the kind I feel comfortable around whether we're dressing up and going out or just popping up for a spontaneous movie night.  Instead of that relational ease, I'll be starting over from scratch to forge a new community.  Not to mention that I'll be moving even further away from a certain fellow.  But it's all enough to make me a little teary-eyed when I stop to think about it.

It's daunting and exciting and crazy and marvelous--all at the same time.  I'm so close, with so much yet to do.  But when I get into my car and leave the town I have always called home, I know it's just a turning page, just a new incredible chapter.  And I can't wait to discover what's written there.