Pre-Departure Blues

It’s a familiar feeling--pre-departure blues. These last few weeks are now rushing toward me and a dull feeling of panic is settling in. Mostly money worries. How am I going to make ends meet while living in India and still pay bills back home? The Fulbright gives a stipend, but most people who go abroad have a secure university position back home and are often receiving sabbatical pay as well. I’ll be making it on the stipend alone. Will I be able to rent a room to help with some expenses? Will I have a job when I come back? How am I going to pay off all the medical bills I have for the physical I had to have to leave?

My life’s lesson must be how to live with nothing secured, and maybe that’s what it all comes down to anyway. Is anything really secure? My house is my refuge, but it could burn down. Marriage certainly doesn’t last forever. Love changes. And jobs? Every job I’ve had has been contract to contract. I really don’t even know if there will be a job when I return so I worry about coming back in the dead of January broke and no way to get by for the coming months.

So I’m homing in. Nesting. At the same time I’m getting my tickets in order, packing my bags and planning to fly to the other side of the world. These stay-at-home blues are familiar, especially now when this whole things seems to have taken on a life of its own.

The thing is, I love to be new places, but I don’t really like the traveling part. I want to get somewhere and then take my time exploring it.