An Untitled Chapter

In my early years here, I said so much. There was a lot to say. Everything around and within me was morphing, changing, revealing, resettling. I was in college, and every day seemed like a new corner of self-discovery and endless possibility. Some of my loquaciousness owed, too, I think, to the developmental stage I was at; that first year I was 20, an adolescent, and I talked through my feelings with the earnestness of someone who needed to figure things out and the candidness of someone who hadn't yet trusted and been burned.

Today I'm much more circumspect. And today, in general, less changes. Most of my twenties were the laying of so much groundwork, all for a career I've now started. I'm still a teacher. I still live in a log cabin in the middle of Alaska. I'm still very, very gay and very, very single and very, very ambivalent about the direction I see my future going. I used to muse endlessly about every potential path, but that's a habit I fell out of around the middle of my twenties. There are too many prospective avenues, and more than a few that might veer unanticipated into your line of sight right before you hit them. Better to report when there's something to report.

I suppose that's a drawn-out way of saying that I'm all right, but in a holding pattern.

As another fall begins here in Alaska, cold and early and yielding swiftly to winter, I have the time and space to sort through some things that have long needed sorting. There are at least five possible career options open to me for next fall, any one of which would take my life in a radically different direction. Which to pursue? Not all of them are in education, as I never saw myself spending my entire professional life as a teacher, and the ones outside the classroom range widely but are each at least feasible. I only get this one life. Just this one span of time. I don't want to waste it.

A further complicating factor, in my life and in the life of this blog, is that some of this work would by definition not be something whose details I could openly discuss. When I was nineteen and my vocational world consisted of lecture halls--led by someone else--and the student newspaper, I was free to divulge every dirty bit. But a job with the federal government? A job in a law-enforcement capacity (strange as that might sound)? If I find success in some of these endeavors, a huge swath of my life will be out of bounds here. But one must advance.

Several years ago, when I was still living on the East Coast, I took a trip into the Goldlands whose nature I never disclosed to you and then had a pleasant lunch with a friend (who's since gotten engaged; what a world). I was, in fact, entering the application process for a federal role about which I felt very passionate, and successfully completed the first round of screening before being eliminated later that year.

"You are a really strong candidate," my assigned mentor told me at the time. I was twenty-seven and had taken the setback well, but it was still a disappointment. "You just need to gain some more life experiences and then come apply again."

Four years later, I'm arranging another trip into a city and shooting for the same goalpost. Working, as well as I can, toward long-term fulfillment. But this is a game that requires patience, and even if I'm chosen it could be more than a year before I learn of it. So other arrangements have to be made in the meantime. Other possibilities weighed.

And then there's just the stuff going on with me, and figuring out the nature of who I am. Coming out on this blog eleven years ago felt emotionally wrenching, but compared to the dilemma facing me now it seems downright easy. I'm not going to elaborate at present because there's nothing to elaborate on, save uncertainty and confusion and a lot of heartache felt over a long time. But you should know that I'm working through some heavy-duty stuff. Trying to get to the bottom of who, exactly, lives in this head of mine. The summer maybe provided some insights.

Way back in January I was planning for a potential visit to a far-off tropical country, but when a number of things on that front fell through I took a hard turn north and wound up in a place I'd dreamed about going since I was twelve years old: Russia.

I had a summer off, a healthy bank account, a near-lifelong ambition, and career aspirations that might be helped by the trip, so I threw caution to the winds and hopped on a plane. There were so many surreal moments during this excursion. Seeing Saint Basil's for the first time, when it sneaked up on me from around a corner and brought tears to my eyes. Walking through an incandescent Red Square at night. Standing before the cavernous entry hall of Russia's largest university, then entering it as a student enrolled in the summer language program. Three weeks in Moscow flew.

For the whole of this near-month I shared an airy, sun-soaked Moscow flat with two Americans, one pursuing a PhD and the other a cultural interest, who quickly became erstwhile friends. On our last day together, after many restaurants and study sessions and museums shared between us, we walked the shiny parquet floor and mused about the strange bond we'd formed.

"When I first met you I was a little bit wary," the 28-year-old PhD candidate, Radical Guy, confessed. "I thought, 'Okay, this is a roommate who's much more social than I am.' But it wound up being a good thing. You got us to do things we wouldn't have done otherwise."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Think about when we went out the other night."

It had been a fun evening, a social mishmash of young professors and international students who had as many reasons for being there as places they came from. Laughter and clinking glasses and halting Russian (quickly mocked in gleeful English) had formed a soundtrack to the gathering.

"Most of those people were there because of you," Radical Guy said. "Engineer Guy and I just kind of showed up. You've really been the social glue of our group."

It was one of the better compliments I've ever gotten, and it happened to be true.

Whatever you're supposed to do, I thought. Whoever you're supposed to be, you are not going to find that person in the middle of Alaska.

I need to find a therapist. I need to make some phone calls. And, in about a month, I need to board another plane, this one taking me to a long weekend and a job screening. Until then, I'm just hanging tight. Trying to be ready to take the right step at whatever juncture comes next.