Exactly two weeks ago, I picked my parents up from the Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport. I had already emptied my storage unit into a 17-foot U-Haul and packed all my remaining possessions into a couple dozen boxes. My parents hit the ground running; we drove directly to the small apartment I shared with Teenypoo & Dash Cunning and emptied it of my belongings as well. After a slightly tearful goodbye, we drove to my friend-turned-boyfriend-about-to-be-roommate's apartment and loaded up his boxes and the majority of his furniture. (A story for another day would be the
"I'm moving to Madison. You can come with me or stay here, but I'm going either way, and I leave in a week" discussion...) The four of us took turns driving either a U-Haul towing a Jeep or my Bonneville. The Chef spent 12 hours straight in the cab of a U-Haul with my father, and they emerged laughing. We stopped in New Mexico and had a lovely dinner with my aunt & her husband. We stopped in Kansas City so I could meet my future sister-in-law and nephew and spend time with my brother, and Chef could see his family. We got to Madison and hauled all our stuff up a small hill and a flight of stairs to our new two-bed, two-bath apartment. My parents drove home. I crashed in my own bed in my own bedroom for the first time in five nights, with my window OPEN.
Madison, Wisconsin. After four years in the desert, it's a little slice of paradise. A city built around two lakes (Monona and Mendota) with an active social scene and a Big 10 university. Also the home of some of my close friends and extended family. So how did this all come about, you may wonder?
I spent the majority of the summer months applying for School Counseling licenses and jobs in two states: Arizona and Wisconsin. I'd had multiple phone and in-person interviews, and while I received great feedback from interviewers, I didn't have a contract. After I flew to Wisconsin to interview and came back to Phoenix as the second choice (again), I realized that I was indeed going to need to formulate and execute a backup plan. I fell into sort of a depression as I looked at after school programs and substitute teaching and classroom aide positions and tutoring...nothing seemed right.
On a particularly bad day, I got a call from a district just outside of Madison. I had applied for a one-year, long term substitute position and they were interested in me. I researched the district online and loved everything I read. I truly enjoyed the phone interview; I got the best feeling from the principal about the school and the district. I began hearing from my references
that same day that they had been called...and then I got the phone call I'd been waiting for all summer;
I got the job! My parents booked a flight for exactly one week after I got the official offer letter and my adventure began.
