Wednesday was my last day as a librarian (sigh, it was lovely); Tuesday will be Steve's last day of work.  I was probably 10 when I last knew what it was for work not to be a major, major chunk of life  . . . whether loving a job, or not, looking for a job, wanting a new job, expecting to find one/a better one soon, planning or retooling for the next, planning life/vacations around a job.  And I'm finding I can do this.  But the organizing of  life-without-a-home looks impossible still, and time-consuming.  The excitement is mounting, though . . . tickets to Quito purchased, hostel arranged, the Andean flute music playing softly in my head.  Major challenge:  two pairs of shoes . . . really?

The details of preparing to launch are tedious and time-consuming at this point -- becoming responsibly homeless, creating a paperless existence, considering and preparing for contingencies, buttoning up life as we've known it.  Sigh.  I'm lucky to be doing this with someone I like so much, and who is deeply competent in arenas where I'm, uh, not. 


There are  lots of unknowns still, but we'll be on the US roads for our 40th (!) anniversary, then in July off to South America.  Wandering the world, attempting to live among the locals for bits of time has been a decades-long dream and it finally seems to be the right time for a walkabout, with kids engaged with their lives, us ready to disengage with ours as we've known it.  It's hard to leave this lovely apartment life in a town with friends, family, activities, jobs we know and like, predictability and loveliness . . .  but life feels short and the world feels big, and it's feeling like now or not.