It has been a little over two weeks since I left my job. In that time, Al and I have packed up our apartment, moved almost all that we own into a little dusty crawl space at my in-laws house, and said temporary goodbyes to our friends (we will be back to see them at the end of the month before we head out for good). We drove the 1,062 miles from Chicago to my parents home in Jacksonville, Florida with our two kitties and giant travel backpacks nestled safely in the back seat.

We are spending the limbo period between moving out of our home and leaving for our big adventure here, soaking up time with my family and doing our best to integrate the cats into their new temporary home, while trying to process everything that has just happened, and finalizing plans for everything that is to come.

The ‘processing everything that just happened’ part is where I am having a little bit of difficulty. I am notoriously horrible with change, and have one of those conflicting personalities where I crave adventure and the comforts of home to an almost equal level. It still has not fully hit me yet what we have done, how severely we have uprooted ourselves, and how abruptly we have ended the life we were so used to in Chicago. I still occasionally get the nagging feeling that I have made a crazy decision.

Recently, I was talking with my best friend about why we struggle so much with certain decisions we make, like my decision to prioritize travel and the unknown over stability and a great life in Chicago, even though it is something I know with absolute certainty that I want to do. I chose to do this. I planned for this. I want to do this. Why does it still feel like such a risk? After hours of discussion (we talk a lot) we came up with what I call our ‘breaking the wheel‘ theory.

The theory goes like this:

We all go through a lot of changes in life.

All of these type of major life changes fall on ‘the wheel’ of life. The trajectory that many of us are set on:  18 years of schooling, followed by some version of a advanced schooling, a job or several (and if you’re lucky, a career), marriage, a home, possibly kids, and retirement. There are variations within the wheel, but it’s a relatively predictable path that many of us follow, myself being no different.

I do want to stop here to clarify; I am not making the argument that there is anything wrong with following this path, or that it doesn’t present its own set of difficulties. I am just suggesting that it may not necessarily a one-size-fits all life, and providing my own personal explanation for why it can sometimes feel difficult for people (like myself) when you have a desire to do something outside of this type of lifestyle.

When I left my childhood home at 18 to go to college, it was difficult and I was homesick, but in my mind, it was the only option. When my four years of college at Indiana University were up, I was devastated. I couldn’t imagine a life where I didn’t live in the same house as my best friends, or just a mile away from the beautiful college campus full of Indiana limestone buildings. Bloomington had become my home. I knew what was expected of me. I was comfortable, and I didn’t want to leave.

But, I had to leave. My four years were up, college was over, it was time to go, the wheel was turning. I spent the next year fumbling my way around various jobs that weren’t a good fit (including being a horribly under-qualified English teacher in Thailand) until I finally found ‘the one’ that would stick for the next 6 years.

I never doubted my decision to look for jobs, to move out of Bloomington, to leave college behind, move to Chicago, or change jobs once my contract ended. I didn’t have a choice. Life or other circumstances were pushing me along the tracks, making my decisions for me, whether I liked it or not. If something went wrong (and it often did), it wasn’t totally my fault. Had the wheel not forced me to move on from those situations, I might never have left them. 

It is somewhat easier to accept and deal with a drastic change when it is forced, because you have no other option, as opposed to making an active and intentional decision towards change when it has an unknown outcome, especially when you are leaving a comfortable situation by choice.

Our decision to quit our jobs to travel the world is not on the wheel (although many could make an argument that it is becoming popular enough to work its way on there). I could have stayed in my previous job, or found a new one, and then kept going until retirement. There are many things besides travel that are not on the wheel. For example, deciding not to go to college and do something else, dedicating your life to becoming a formula one race car driver, or starting a farm animal sanctuary, just to name a few.

It is my theory as to why so many of us find ourselves feeling stuck. After we’ve hit the majority of life points on the wheel before retirement, there is rarely anything forcing us to move to the next stage, to make a change, or to take a leap. So instead, we coast. We go through the motions of life. Life is no longer pulling us along, and we are just riding out the momentum, spinning along and running out the clock.

However, if we do decide to break the wheel and go rogue, we are agreeing to accept full responsibility for what comes next. If things end up going poorly, or if our decision to do this sets our lives down a series of unfortunate and negative circumstances, we have no one to blame but ourselves.

I somehow had the disillusioned belief that if I stay on the wheel, I am safe. Nothing can hurt me. And if anything goes wrong, it is not my fault, because I followed the rules and did all the things I believed I was supposed to do by signing some non-existent life contract, to ensure a good life.

Of course, I realize that none of this is true. I am no safer staying on the track I think I am ‘supposed’ to be on, than on the track that I set for myself. It is simply waking up and realizing that you don’t have to live the life you thought you were supposed to. You are allowed to change your circumstance, change your mind, make a different decision, or take a scary leap and see what happens. If things don’t go the way I thought they would, thats okay. If they do work out, even better.

Breaking the wheel isn’t just about making huge life altering decisions like the one we have coming up, but deciding that I am not okay with taking a backseat in my own life, and instead making active decisions towards achieving my goals and building the life I want (where I don’t dread Mondays, obviously). Breaking the wheel is easier said than done, but it will be a good reminder for me on this journey.

Plus, if it’s a good enough motto for Daenerys Targaryen, it’s good enough for me.

https://youtu.be/T0K14HBSWw0?t=47s

I have kept a journal since I was seven years old. I wrote about the first time I saw The Lion King in theaters, and how I felt when Princess Diana died. Around the age of eighteen, when I got my first laptop, I started typing out diary entries when I didn’t feel like hand-writing them. I have over a decade of ramblings saved on word documents.

Recently I have been going through some of these ramblings while doing my annual computer back-up, and stumbled across this letter I wrote to myself when I was 23 years old. I wish I could say this was the only time that I have written a letter to myself, but that is not the case.

The letter is advice to my thirty year old self, and I enjoyed reading it through the eyes of a younger me. Although I am not quite thirty yet, I figure this is a good reminder for when I do hit the milestone in about six months.

Me at 23, back when I apparently knew it all.

June, 2010

Your twenties are supposed to be a crazy, unstable, scary, and confusing time. I have read endless articles and blogs where the author contemplates what they would tell their twenty-something self if they could go back in time. Lessons they wish they could have imparted upon their younger, less developed self. The most popular wisdom seems to go something like this:

–Wear a two-piece and short skirts! You’ll look back on pictures and miss your 20-year old body!

-Don’t go tanning. Stop slathering on baby oil next to your friends and spending hours on a beach chair, you might look cute now, but you won’t later.

-Don’t worry about such-and-such boy, what other people think about you, stop being so pathetic, just love yourself and everything else falls into place.

-Monitor your credit card spending and money, stop dropping $200 every time you go to a bar. You’re not a Kardashian.

I can’t argue that these aren’t valid pieces of advice. However, if my thirty year old self figured out a way to communicate with me from my future, and was like, “Hey Megan, I’m here to tell you it’s ok to start buying sluttier dresses, as long as you don’t spend too much on it-because you need to be saving for retirement. Got it?’ I’d be like, I can’t believe my 30 year old self wasted her one chance at time travel for that useless advice.

So, I decided to write my thirty year old self a letter. This way, if she ever figures out time travel and decides to use it as a method to communicate to her twenty year old self, she’ll have this letter to refer to:

Dear thirty year old Megan,

First things first. Don’t write me a letter with your advice, I’ll just ignore it. Instead, pay attention.

Your twenties have been awesome. Granted, I’m only about three years in, but so far they have gotten considerably better every year. You have done some seriously amazing things.

At 23, you know you don’t have it all together, but it’s cool. Don’t worry about that. Right now, let’s talk about thirty-something-year old you.

Most importantly, please do not stop being awesome.

I’ve seen people hit their thirties and instantly panic if they haven’t hit certain life-milestones. I’ve also seen the opposite. People just instantly get boring when they hit their thirties, and decide it’s time to ‘settle down’ or whatever that means.

Don’t misunderstand. By awesome, I do not mean going out clubbing with twenty-somethings every night and trying to reclaim your youth. Nothing about that is awesome. I mean continuing to always strive to find what you love, never becoming complacent, and always challenging yourself when things start to feel too easy.

If I were to guess, most of the people you know are probably much farther along in the ‘life stages’ race than you. Do not let yourself think that this is a bad thing, or that you need to catch up. Even now, you worry that you aren’t making enough money, that you aren’t far enough in your career, that you are making bad ‘life moves’ by chasing your travel dreams. You should know by now, that you cannot make any wrong decisions. Everyone has their own direction to take. Keep taking yours, never compare, and never look back.

Keep in touch with your friends, and make a huge effort to stay as close as possible with them, no matter where life takes everyone. This is a big one. These people in your life at 23 are the best friends you will ever have. There are not other people in the world that exist like them. They are the most supportive and caring people on the planet, and if you let that fall by the wayside, then you have failed at life. Seriously.

This is probably the most important part of this letter, and also the cheesiest.

As long as you are healthy, relatively happy, and have your friends and family-nothing else matters. I know you probably don’t believe this, and think it’s just your 23 year old naïvety talking, but it’s true. You are a chronic over analyzer-but sometimes the best thing to do is just stop thinking. Stop thinking and spend time each day being ridiculously grateful for where you are, and the opportunities you have in your life.

And please, for god’s sake, throw away all our jean skirts. They aren’t coming back, and if they do, that’s none of your concern.

Love,

23 year old Meg

January has always been a rough month for me, and I am not sorry to see it go this year.

Mondays lately haven’t been looking so hot, despite my efforts in beer tasting and resolution making. I don’t know what it is about January that always puts me in a weird funk.

Thats a lie, I do know why.

The weather, post holidays, the long dark and cold days without sunlight, just to name a few.

It probably didn’t help that on my way to work today, I started thinking about the undeniable fact that I am less than six months away from turning 30 years old (clearly I wasn’t trying very hard to pull myself out of my January funk). My thoughts went something like this:

My career has hit a complete brick wall.

I can’t believe how much I’ve had to spend on dental bills this year already.

Why can’t I force myself to get up an extra 30 minutes early to make my hair look more presentable? All the other girls in my office seem to pull it off.

It’s because everyone else has their life together way more than I do. 

Will I ever stop being the type of girl (woman?) who wears out her clothes until they have holes in them?

And so on.

Just as I was getting knee deep into the mud of my own self-judgement, I thought about my mother. For whatever reason, I began to wonder what kind of things she must have wondered about at my age.

At my age, my mother was married, with two tiny rambunctious girls, and pregnant with her third – me! She had moved away from home, to a city where she knew no one, back when people were still writing letters to keep in touch. She had already gotten her masters degree in education, and was working full time as a teacher, while my dad finished his masters degree.

At my age, she was just beginning to lay down the ground work of a life that she would continue to build for the next 30 years. A life that would grow wider and deeper and strong enough to create the foundation where my roots would eventually grow.

My point is, I have a hard time imagining she worried too much about her hair. She was too busy raising a family, building a career she found meaning in, surviving.

Then again, we Fitzpatrick women have always had wild hair, so maybe she did think about it from time to time.

Either way, thinking about what my mom was like at my age forced me out of my negative thought process about my own life to see a bigger perspective. I am not making the argument that my life isn’t as rich or meaningful because I don’t have children, or I am not working towards a masters degree. Everyone has their own individual battles and challenges, and no one way is better than the other.

What it shifted my thinking to instead, is how inspiring it is to me when people create a life of meaning for themselves. Not a life based on what looks good on the outside, or a life that aims to hit the checkpoints that we are conditioned to think we should be reaching at certain ages, but a life that calls to them individually.

Nothing motivates me more than seeing women succeed within their own terms of what success means for them.

This led me to think about all the women in my life that inspire me, and how little would get accomplished if I continue to spend too much time worrying about where I think I should be by now, and instead just focus on building the life that I actually want to live.

In an effort to leave January behind, and start February off right, I have put together a list of women who are motivating me to actively work towards the life that I want, and the type of woman I want to become, instead of worrying about what everyone around me is doing.

Taylor Swift

Why She Inspires Me:

I don’t care what people say, I love Taylor Swift. Not only is she the highest paid woman in music at 26, but she also writes her own music, and plays four instruments, which to me, is the equivalent of speaking four different languages. She isn’t afraid to speak up for what she believes in, like when she pulled all of her music from Spotify because it doesn’t properly compensate artists, and then proceeded to write an open letter to Apple for the same reason, influencing Apple to completely shift their music streaming policies.

Taylor really solidified that she was a woman after my own heart when she announced she was giving away all proceeds for her music video Wildest Dreams to the African Parks Foundation of America. 

I could go on and on about the reasons I love Taylor, but the reason she made my list above all others, is her focus on surrounding yourself with women who build each other up. I am lucky enough to have women in my life who are each other’s biggest cheerleaders, and who find true joy in one another’s successes. I have seen firsthand how powerful this type of support can be. I don’t care if you like her music or not, that’s something we all can get behind.

Favorite Taylor Quote: 

“The one thing I do believe as a feminist is that in order for us to have gender equality we have to stop making it a girl fight, and we have to stop being so interested in seeing girls trying to tear each other down — it has to be more about cheering each other on as women…”

Doctor Hawa Abdi 

Why she inspires me: 

I first heard of Hawa Abdi in 2011, after watching her TED Talk on running a hospital with her daughters in Somalia during war-time. Abdi has dedicated her life to serving her own country, founding the Dr. Hawa Abdi Foundation, which is both a camp and hospital that provides basic needs to the refugees and most poverty-stricken communities in Somalia. She has been described by Glamour magazine as “equal parts Mother Teresa and Rambo.” Today she runs and brings awareness to a camp for over 90,000 people, most of whom are women and children.

Women who fight peacefully, by contributing their skills and gifts to those who need it the most in times of conflict are huge role models for me. Whenever I find myself complaining about the cold Chicago weather, or a work project I am not particularly excited about, I think about Abdi, and it instantly humbles me.

Favorite Abdi Quote:

Abdi was held hostage at her camp in 2010 by Islamist Militants, and told (as half of her camp got destroyed) that she couldn’t run camps like hers since she was a woman. Her response to her captures is one of the (many) things that put her on my list, and earned the slot for my favorite Abdi quote:

“You can’t do things like this. You are a woman.” She responded: “You are a man — you have two testes. A goat also has two testes. What have you done for your society?”

Beyonce

Why She Inspires Me:

I almost left Queen B off the list, because I thought she was too obvious of a choice. Then I realized this is my blog, and I can write whatever I want, and I LOVE BEYONCE, so how could I ever leave her off the list of women that inspire me?

It is hard for me to explain just exactly why I love Beyonce so much. When I watch her perform, I instantly feel like more of a bad-ass, even if I have just wasted an hour of my life on a YouTube bender of music videos (which I may or may not have just done after I decided to put Beyonce on my list). Beyonce has made herself into a business, has been named Forbes #1 most influential celebrity, beating out Oprah, and her husband, Jay Z. She uses her powers for good, shining her spotlight on things like gender equality and women’s empowerment. She’s successful because she works extremely hard, and does things her own way.

Favorite Beyonce Quote: ‘It is so liberating to really know what I want, what truly makes me happy, what I will not tolerate. I have learned that it is no one else’s job to take care of me but me.’

Malala

Why She Inspires Me:

If you have watched He Named Me Malala, or read I Am Malala, you will have no doubt why this 18 year old made my list. She survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban after speaking out for the right for girls to get an education in Pakistan, and is the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

Her survival story is no doubt amazing, but what she turned her life into after the assassination attempt is what makes her so inspiring. She says, “the terrorists thought they would change my aims and stop my ambitions, but nothing changed in my life except this: weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage were born.” It is impossible to watch her speak and not be completely absorbed in what she is saying and how strongly she delivers her message. The attempt on her life made her fearless, and even more determined in her campaign for women’s education.

I tend to be the most quiet and reserved in a group or professional setting, and keep most of my thoughts to myself. Malala inspires me to see the value in speaking up, and that my voice and opinion do matter, just as every woman’s does. If Malala hadn’t been so vocal about what she believed in, she wouldn’t have been able to draw so much attention to women’s rights, and actually get people to pay attention.

Favorite Malala Quote: 

I speak not for myself but for those without a voice… those who have fought for their rights… their right to live in peace, their right to be treated with dignity, their right to equality of opportunity, their right to be educated.

J.K. Rowling

Why She Inspires Me:

If J.K Rowling had done nothing else but bring Harry Potter into our universe, that would have been enough. She became the first person in the world to become a billionaire from a book, and then quickly fell off the billionaire’s list due to how much of her money she ended up giving away to charity. She is vocal on political issues, and doesn’t ever shy away from speaking up for what is right. Her Harvard commencement speech makes me cry every single time I watch it. When I read the Harry Potter books, I am forever amazed by the amount of imagination and storytelling she has swirling around in her brain.

All those things are reasons that she inspires me, but her views on failure are what remind me that even the most successful people have faced great failure in life, and it is never an excuse to stop trying. I can tend to let failures in my life have too much power, and stop me from moving forward with a certain thing, but, if J.K Rowling had done that, we wouldn’t have Harry Potter, so it’s really in my best interest to take a page out of her book.

Favorite J.K. Rowling Quote: “As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.”

—

I could keep going with my list of amazing women, but I am starting to feel pretty good about taking on Monday, and a new month. Sometimes all we need when we’re feeling sluggish is to draw strength from women like Taylor, Abdi, Malala, Yonce, and Jo, and we’re back on track.

Until next time.

Love,

Meg

With 2015 coming to a close this week, I realized pretty quickly that I wasn’t up for the task of trying to summarize the past year into a single blog post. I decided I would attempt to do it using pictures instead. I started looking through all my pictures for one highlight from each month-a way for me to reflect on how I spent 2015.

Once I started looking back on pictures from the first half of the year, I started to re-think my strategy, since all I was finding were variants of the following:

It’s not that I didn’t spending my year doing things, because I know I spent a considerable amount of time filling up my days with all the things that people do; work, dinners, friends, weekend trips, happy hours, etc. All those things that make up a life, I know I did, regardless of my iPhoto history telling a different, more cat-filled story.

However, it did remind me that 2015, for the most part, felt like the year of waiting.

For the first half of the year, I was waiting for my wedding in July. Anyone who has planned a wedding might understand the feeling that there is a small period of your life during the throes of wedding planning, that your life temporarily hangs in suspension during a weird pre-wedding limbo period. You often find find yourself saying things like, “We’ll make a decision on that after the wedding.” For me, this time happened between January and July of this year.

I would stare at the calendar constantly, counting the months on my hands, updating the countdown on the small blackboard in our kitchen, wondering if July 11th, 2015 would ever actually come to be.

In case you were wondering, it did.

Once our wedding date passed, from July 11th on, I found myself constantly waiting for the next step. Waiting for certain big events and obligations to pass. I would write down each weekend plan we had, and check off how many days I had to live between now and my next break from work, or the next thing I had to look forward to that would help me get from point A to B of my life.

Before I had time to think about what had happened, I found myself staring at the tail end of 2015 with the realization that I had spent over an entire year waiting. And as everyone has heard at one point or another,

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans. 

It’s not that I didn’t enjoy my year because of this, but the feeling that you are always waiting for the next thing in life, can make it extremely difficult to fully engage in the life you are already living. 

I realized that this is something I am going to need to learn how to conquer, because my life is never going to be comprised soley of events that are worthy of being marked with carefully drawn doodles on my dry erase calendar.

The reality is, every year, we have some big moments:

And some not-so-big moments:

My year of waiting has taught me that the in-between-moments of life are just as important and worthy of my attention as the big moments, and it is up to me to make sure I am making those days count, instead of simply wishing them away.

My challenge to myself this year, is to stop waiting for time to pass, and instead, work on filling up my days with things that make me happy, and that bring me joy right now.

Like anything in life that is worthwile, it will be easier said than done, but I always argue that giving it a try is better than the alternative.

Wishing everyone a new year filled with happiness for every momentous, mundane, and in-between moment that comes your way.

Meg

Chicago has thousands of sushi restaurants. In my neighborhood alone, I can think of about 15 different sushi places that are within a 3 block radius of each other.

I can also admit that I have tried almost every single one of them. But, I always come back to the same one.

Kabuki.

jumping for joy.

Kabuki is easily the place in Chicago that I have frequented most often in the past 6 years. I can’t exactly put my finger on why it is my favorite. It could be because I have always lived relatively close to it, and I can be pretty lazy about venturing out of my neighborhood. I tend to think it is because the prices are reasonable, the portions are huge, and they always give us free stuff when we come.

drool.

It has also always been BYOB  (bring your own bottle). My friends and I would file in from the cold, sit at the same long table in the back, crack open bottle after bottle of chardonnay, while being as loud and obnoxious as we wanted to be. It was the only place we felt comfortable enough to do that.

Last week, Al and I decided to treat ourselves to a delicious sushi dinner. Whenever one of us mentions the idea of getting Kabuki, we both get instantly giddy, picturing ourselves surrounded by endless rolls of goodness. So, we went.

And when we arrived, we saw this:

Needless to say, we were devastated. This was a game changer. We can no longer justify spending money on both sushi AND wine, when there are so many other sushi places offering BYOB just a stones throw away, thus making them more affordable than Kabuki.

And so, I am dealing with this pain in the only way I know how. Also, I decided to write this to help me get from 4pm-5pm at work today. It’s Monday. Don’t judge me.

An Ode to Kabuki

this is my ode to a special place

where I often did go to stuff my face

birthdays, celebrations, it was always a good time

made even better since we could bring our own wine

we’d walk up to her doors, then we’d gaze at her beauty

the red neon lights signaling we’ve arrived at Kabuki

one by one we’d choose our favorite roll

then shamelessly devour them without self control

dragon, california, spider, all served on a boat

seconds they’d last ’til they were shoved down my throat

we’d pour the saki and drink our wine

thankful for our favorite place to dine

until that fateful day when I arrived

and read a sign that pained my eyes

I still can’t believe they’d do this to me

and remove the joys of BYOB

So one last time we paid our respects

Christie, Dan, Al, Nina, Zach, me and Bex

In person and in spirit we all said goodbye

to the greatest sushi place we ever did try.

The End.

P.S., I feel like I should probably mention that the real reason I won’t be returning to Kabuki is because I have ( painfully and reluctantly) given up eating fish, which also means giving up my all time favorite food (sushi), but sometimes it’s easier to blame someone other than yourself. A post for a different time.