Looking Back

2001 didn’t start all that well for me.

Jake and I were supposed to welcome the New Year in Savannah with his family. In the middle of our fist day I started losing feeling on my legs. After a phone call to the doctor, where I was told that I had two herniated discs and had to go back home and lie in bed, we took the 6am plane the next day and spent New Year’s eve and the week after in bed.

The low-key New Year’s eve turned out to be the best Jake and I ever had. We played video games all night long and got up for some sparkling cider at midnight. Which proved that 2001 might not turn out awful after all.

I spent February to May undergoing regular physical therapy. At the same time, I got asked to manage the project I was working on while keeping my three-days-a-week arrangement. I worked at New York Society for the Deaf and took five courses including learning to make pottery and play the saxophone.

The summer of 2001 brought many questions. My back was finally starting to feel better and I knew I wanted to change my life. I took fewer classes and decided I wanted to do more in the city. We’d talked about moving before next summer and I knew it might be our last summer in the city. We went to book readings, we took walks in the park, we spent most of our days outside. We talked. We made decisions. We agreed not to be afraid.

In the fall I decided that I was ready to give up my career. I decided it was time to start living the life I’ve wanted. Time to be proud of myself. Time to make my life worthwhile. I filled applications for the two places that promised to change my life. I went back to physical therapy when my neck started hurting out of the blue. I began volunteering at Housingworks as well as NYSD and took on six new courses. I was going to spend most of the fall waiting to hear and the less time I had to sit around and wonder the better it would be. I knew that the news wouldn’t arrive until January.

It turned out to be sooner. December 2001 might hold the record for the most eventful month in my life. The last week of November I found out that I was called back to have an interview with Teach for America on December 6th. I spent the next two weeks practicing my five-minute teaching session so many times that I could do it in my sleep. That Thursday morning, I woke up at 6:30 and got to the interview a half-hour early. I spent the morning teaching, discussing, writing and the afternoon with my one-on-one interview. By three in the afternoon, I was so worn out that I went to sleep as soon as I got home. That night Jake proposed to me at Rockefeller Center, the next morning my boss informed me that the firm decided to promote me to Vice President. Ten days later, I found out that I got accepted to Teach for America.

Talk about a busy and life-changing month.

I’m still waiting for some more news. I am supposed to find out the state that I teach in, in the next week or two. A week after that I hear from Stanford. And then we sit down to make some decisions. 2002 promises to be an eventful year for me. A wedding, a career change, a new house and a car are just the beginning of my New Year.

Looking back to the eve of 2001, I would have never guessed that this would be the year in which my life changed. The year that I started at the bottom but am finishing on top.

May 2002 bring even more luck, laughter, health and love to all of us.

Happy New Year.

Previously? Assigned Roles.