Back to Work

I accepted a job offer yesterday! on July 28 I'll be working at The Freelon Group, a very highly-respected, design-focused architecture firm out in RTP (Research Triangle Park). Though I've never been a big fan of work, I am a big fan of not being bored and poor, so I'm eager to get back into it and start taking steps towards the primary objective this year--licensure. Practicing architecture and being surrounded by architects will certainly help.

To celebrate, I went out to eat at the Cameron Bar & Grill, which is one of the dozen restaurants at the shopping area Cameron Village down the road from my apartment. As usual, I decided to walk. I made it about a hundred feet from the apartment when the first outer swipe of the new tropical storm headed in from the south and just dumped water all over the place. I made it to the restaurant before the sky really opened up; it rained so hard that the satellite TV service in the bar shut down for five minutes. I was looking forward to dessert after my burger, but managed to misconvey to the bartender that I was done eating. I stopped back at Rite Aid on my way home and bought wine and a box of Fiddle Faddle to continue the celebration... not a good mix, by the way. Don't know why I didn't see that coming... so I saved the wine for this weekend and mowed the Fiddle Faddle watching The Simpsons. Quite a fitting celebration. Oh, by the way, the rain had stopped by the time I left the bar, so I didn't get any wetter.

I'm now two weeks into my life here in Raleigh, and although they are certain to be uncharacteristic weeks when viewed across my broader time here, I'm feeling optimistic about the potential there is to be happy here. I recently noted that, unlike in Cambridge, I am not always angry here. That anger ranged from pissiness at work, sidewalk rage, landlord/apartment-related anger, weather fatigue, etc. and was perhaps only lessened by the narcotic of TV. So far in Raleigh, that anger has been largely replaced by fear and apprehension... which most people would think is not a great swap, but for me, fear ebbs much quicker than anger does. Which means that the next few weeks and months have great potential to be... pleasant? After that, who knows if I'll slide back into my standard mode of finding things to be angry about. The fact that I'll be shocking my system with a series of professional exams over the next year makes me think I can keep the apprehension up long enough to forestall the anger. Baby steps!