I absolutely love being a story teller. Last night I finally felt the must after weeks without her and wrote 1,500 words without strain. Afterwards I buzzed with excitement and the thrill of the zone. The construction of a story comes easily to me, as I think it must to most writers, and while I have to plan out the characters, etc., the basic story elements are natural. I stand back and look at the world I've just created and the people I've fashioned and it fills me with immense satisfaction.

Changing gears radically, everyone I know, it seems, is looking west. Randy a host of his friends live out there. Denise has lived in California for awhile now. Alicia lives in Washington. Now my brother will be moving to California in about a month. With my mom in Florida this leaves my dad and I as the only two people left in the Midwest. I never thought I'd be the one to stay here, and I still don't want to stay here, but what a windfall of unexpected events. Giles and his family moved to Milwaukee. My best friend is moving to Dallas. All these things are in motion...or rather, I things have always been moving like this but you don't realize it until it hits you in the face. Cheryl went to Bolivia. Kristy went to Japan. All the people I care about are really, truly scattered now, and not just a state or a few cities or a few hours apart. No, everyone as managed to scatter themselves across the world.

Now more than ever the writing is on the wall (add other cliches here). It is time, it has been time what am I saying, to find some new surroundings, a new state, a new job, a new life, a new set of experiences, different people, etc. It is time for me to keep this momentum going and carry it over to a job search and find some place else to commit my energies and time. I have another year to teach in Indiana, but that also gives me a year to find something new.

Tom Petty spoke the truth...

"Time to move on,
it's time to get going,
what lies ahead I have no way of knowin'.

But under my feet baby,
grass is growin'
yeah, it's time to move on
time to get goin'."