by way of introduction

To say that I had goals when I graduated from college would not be entirely accurate. I wouldn't even say I had a plan, really. No goals, no plans, just a vague sort of leaning. I wasn't going to grad school right away and I'd just been on the receiving end of the failure of a three-year relationship; Madison seemed like as good a place as any for my reentry into the world. The fact that my ex was going to be living there too only factored a tiny percentage into my decision. Like, 10% max. Okay, maybe 25%. Okay, maybe more, we all learn from our mistakes, let's move on, DON'T JUDGE ME!!

Two months after packing up my movie posters and extra-long sheets, I was stacking slabs of plywood onto cement bricks, creating a set of hobo bookshelves in the corner of my studio apartment in the heart of downtown Madison. My "apartment" had a murphy bed and forgotten porn that the previous resident had abandoned in one of the many cabinets surrounding it. I started my new job as a tele-recruiter the next day and The Terror hadn't set in yet. I was still riding the jet streams from graduation, that delightful linear sensation of "first I'll do this, then I'll do this." I had it in my mind that I'd live in Madison for awhile and then apply to the PhD program for psychology at UW.

At least a year passed before I realized that I didn't really want to get a PhD in psychology, and although I had no idea what I was looking for in life, I certainly wouldn't find it in Madison, Wisconsin. Don't get me wrong; Madison is great. For five months out of the year, Madison is fantastic. But after another six months in the Midwest, I rented a U-Haul and got the hell out of dodge. It was around this time--sleeping on my mom's couch in Kentucky and getting up early to drive to my temp job at the University of Louisville--that The Terror really sank its claws in. It was as if all my life I'd been walking down a path in the forest. Sometimes the path was rocky, uphill; sometimes it was glorious, paved, and in the sunlight. All these 18 years of school, knowing exactly what was in front of me--more path. All these 18 years and suddenly I found myself in the middle of the fucking forest, in the space between paths, where the grass had grown up high to my knees. Surrounded by nothing but freedom.

Sweet, delicious, crippling freedom.