salience

Curiosity is something I've been thinking a lot about lately. In part due to listening "Never Grow Old" by The Cranberries on loop, but also because fall is coming, my most pensive season change of the year. You know how we always see people not in how they look but in how they carry themselves? One of my office mamas is a woman nearing 70 from Ireland. She came to America at 17 and met her late husband in New York. Since then she's had three kids and owned two businesses. She dances often and goes to the gym six times a week. You'd never think her elderly in speaking to her, she has a vivacity and sincerity about her too strong to overlook. She is always asking me questions about the music I listen to or the projects I create in the apartment. She is an inspiration for self-learning.

What is a midlife crisis? A friend at work and I were talking this over the other day. I know I will not be in New York forever, I cannot settle here, it's not for me. And I am okay with that, I simply want to make the best with the time I am allowing myself here. The experience and content are what I seek out, not blinders to a routine. Is the crisis when one realizes she has checked out mentally in her own life, unaware of what she has or has not become in a specified time period? Disappointment in how little she has gotten done since she made that first "Great Plan" for her life all those years ago?

I am happy here. I am learning how to make the most of a long distance relationship. By the time I see Alex next it will have been two months since we've seen each other. My family is doing well. El Sphinx is healthy, Lorenzo has settled in for his second year at Wake Forest, my sisters are in their final year of high school panicking about college and el papa is making due as he always does. Looking at my calendar, this fall will pass just as quickly as the last. I am traveling a fair amount to make sure I see everyone I can before the new year. Despite all of the travel, I have a close group of friends in the city. We don't spend money often, but we have a great time wherever we go. My apartment is becoming more my home every day. I consider myself an islander now, my identity here very much defined by the perspective, quiet and safety of this small town in the big city. Despite the frustration my job has caused me, I remind myself that I am a year out of school, biding my time until I continue my education. When will that be exactly? Fall 2008 is the current plan. Law School? MBA? A joint program? We will see what happens. The one good thing has been my company backing me to take the CFA I Examination on 2 December. It's a small step, but at least I can study Finance on my own time.

For now I focus on nurturing my curiosity and removing emotion from the choices I make. When you allow yourself no hesitation or anxiety, decisions become very clear. Each day is a step towards what I have to do for me to live where and how I want to. The idea is not to avoid a midlife crisis entirely, I know it's not possible to rule out the aftershock of the parameters of the unknown. But to find comfort in that it all does work out in time.