This past Sunday night I stayed up so I could countdown, New Year’s Eve style, to midnight. I wanted to officially welcome the end of my work contract. Ever since making the final decision to leave my job, I have yearned for June 30th, knowing that was the time when I would be able to finally close the door on my job as the principal of a school and the god-awful experience I had all year with the person who was supposed to be my mentor. Though there has been much mental preparation for it, I still woke up the next day and had an intense feeling of “Now what?” I felt like one of those fish at the end of “Finding Nemo” when they finally have their freedom from the aquarium in the dentist’s office and they’re kind of looking around and one of them utters that same phrase, “now what?” I went about my day on Monday doing random things around the house but with a different mentality. Usually I would think about the next day in terms of what I would get done when I got home from work. But now there is no work to come home from. When I was a teacher, this part of the summer meant that soon I would be receiving my back-to-school email that had details about going back to work in August. That’s not coming now. I was the one who sent the email last year, but now there is nothing. I don’t mean to say that there is nothing to look forward to because I certainly did NOT look forward to those letters that indicated summer break was going to soon start ending.
These “now what” thoughts aren’t new though. I had them more and more frequently as the inevitable end to my career came closer and closer. I have spent 19 years of my life being an educator at the same school. There was such intense devotion to this vocation that now that I know with 100% certainty that I don’t want to do this anymore, who am I without it? Being an educator was honestly a large part of my identity. I don’t have children of my own. My students were my children and I treated them as such. What is my purpose now though? Who am I?
A previous post of mine detailed songs that have been anthems to me lately. There are a few movies as well that I have watched on repeat too for various reasons. I’ve described the impact of “The Devil Wears Prada”, which I watched Sunday night during my countdown to midnight. But there’s another movie that I relate to now: “Julie & Julia”. It’s the movie that details how the chef Julia Child got her start and simultaneously, how Julie Powell started a blog chronicling her year of cooking all the recipes in Julia Child’s French cookbook. I feel a connection to both of these stories because at the beginning of the movie, Julia Child, played by Meryl Streep, asks her husband, “What should I do?”. She is trying to figure out what she wants to do with her life. She ultimately discovers a passion for cooking. But she questions herself along the way. Julie Powell, played by Amy Adams, wants to be a writer, but has a boring office job. She creates the cooking challenge for herself as a way to give herself purpose. Her blog becomes very popular and she eventually gets book deal offers. Secretly I’d like to have such success with my blog and also write a book. But both of these ladies had to take time to really ponder who they were and what their purpose in life was. That’s me right now.
I think what I have to remember is that I’m still the same person I have always been. I’m simply unemployed. A job doesn’t define a person. It’s a job. Because I walked away from the education field doesn’t mean that I am no longer caring. That I don’t want to help people. I still love all the same things, probably now more than before. I love my husband with every bit of my heart, even more so since he has been nothing but 100% supportive of every decision I have made since first mentioning that I might not want to keep doing this anymore. I am still a homebody and love being at home with my dog and two cats who don’t quite get along yet. My hobbies and interests are all the same. So really, who I am hasn’t changed.
It’s a very interesting time right now. I am waiting to hear from a job that I interviewed for last week. I really want this job but I have decided that I’m going to practice my faith and give it over to God. Since I don’t know what my purpose in life is right now, I’m going to let Him guide me. If I’m meant to get that job, I’ll get it. I have to accept that I also might be meant to take some time off. That’s a concept for a whole other post. I’m too impatient to take time off. It’s already July and teachers on summer break are starting to think about going back to work in August. What will happen if August gets here and I still don’t have a job? Definitely lots to think about, but not much that I can actually change and do anything about. So much of this is out of my hands. But like that song “Hand in My Pocket” that I’ve been listening to over and over, “everything’s going to be fine, fine, fine”. I really believe it will too.
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