What California Taught Me

Ya'll. I love this word. Or contraction. Even though I always contract it in the wrong place. I think it looks better that way.

I have been back in Socorro, New Mexico, for about 12 hours now. We went to the post office this morning. There were 3 dogs outside, without leashes, patiently waiting for their owner, who was presumably inside. Inside, a woman with a baby pulled a ringing cell phone out of her cleavage, answered it while at the counter being helped, and proceeded to have a very loud, very annoyed conversation with someone who may or may not have been her mother about someone who may or may not have been the baby-daddy. (I don't even know how to write that 'word.') These are some of the reasons I know I am in Socorro. How else do I know? I live in a manufactured home. Let me just point out that there is not necessarily anything wrong with manufactured homes. But this manufactured home is very old (for a manufactured home) and very rickety. And it is in Socorro. That is what is wrong with it. How else do I know? It is quiet. That is a good thing about Socorro and is one of the reasons I sometimes like it here. The other being that I can walk places and there is a park down the street with tennis courts. The other is that it is not as scary as Albuquerque. The reasons I don't like it here are multitude. I will not go into them now.

On the last day of our honeymoon, as we were not flying out until 8pm, we stopped for a few hours in Berkeley to check out the town and campus and to see our friend Jenny again. Jenny and I used to have the same lives, sort of. We went to UA for two years and got degrees in hydrology. Then we both worked from home for two different National Labs making a lot of money. Now she is working on a PhD and I am still working for the National Lab. She misses the DOE. I wish I didn't know what the DOE was. Berkeley is beautiful.

Whenever I tell people I work from home, I get one of two responses. 1) Wow, that must be so nice! 2) Wow, I don't think I could handle that! I go back and forth between these responses in my head. 1) If I didn't work from home, I couldn't be writing this blog in the middle of the day. If I didn't work from home, I couldn't have slept in until 9 this morning in recovery from my honeymoon. If I didn't work from home, I wouldn't see my husband (!!) as much. If I didn't have this job, I would not be able to travel as much. 2) If I worked in an office, I would have a distinct line between work and home. If I worked in an office, I would not look around the house for things to clean and then never do it. If I worked in an office, I would talk to people other than my husband on a daily basis. If I worked in an office, I would probably get more work done.

In the beginning of my work from home, I did well. I have been slacking lately. I think it is because I know it will be over fairly soon and maybe sooner if I work too hard.

What California taught me is that I shouldn't take my DOE job for granted. I should aspire to live somewhere with public transportation and hiking down the street. It's not like I didn't know these things before. I mostly just thought the title was cute.

I think we will have to (get to?) move to Albuquerque soon. These are the things I want out of it:

• Proximity to walking/jogging/hiking paths
• Public transportation to UNM and my job (if I have one)
• Weekly boxes from Los Poblanos Organics and a work-share to get 1/2 off
• People to talk to and maybe even friends!
• Things to do with my husband instead of watching Netflix

Will I miss Socorro? Will Matt ever miss Arizona (or admit it)? Will the grass always be greener? I assume so. On all three counts.

PS Do you love how I've been throwing the h-word around?