As a teenager, I was rather certain I would do something unique with my life.
I was sitting one day about five years ago waiting to introduce myself at a work training and realized that I was about to say “My name is Autumn. I’ve worked for the agency for five years and I’ve been married for 5 years, have a house, two dogs, and some chickens.” I felt a remnant of my teenage self squirm. What the heck was I doing and where had I gone wrong?!
Fast forward to 2012 and a lot of changes have been made. Not just for the sake of changing . . . well a FEW things just for the sake of shaking things up. I will admit I thrive on adding variation to my life. As I mentioned in the post A Measure of Success, I wasn’t happy back that day I realized my life was completely typical (okay, not everyone keeps chickens). I was floating and bored.
So Raven and I took steps to break off the path we’d lumbered on to. I got my motorcycle license, we traveled, sold the house, moved into a yurt, I started writing and pursued publishing. We had all of these plans in action for this potential and exciting future that would be ours – something not typical and not based on what everyone else thought would fit us.
Two recent visits of friends to our yurt gave me new insight into this unfolding goal.
The first was a couple who also live in Maine. Its been awhile since we had company to the yurt and with the building going on with a goal to be in our new digs by fall, some of the daily yurt cleaning tasks have slipped. But that was okay. We ended up swapping stories and feeling much more comfortable as our company related their MUCH more exotic living arrangements when younger though they have a house now. A messy yurt was nothing. We had a grand time and talked for hours. I’d really like to have them back!
The second visit was some old (think high school era) friends from out of state. Like the pair from the first fist, this couple lives in a more traditional structure, but are opened minded and wanted to see the yurt. It didn’t go that well. Their visit barely last forty-five minutes before they made a hasty retreat, never really hiding their discomfort with our living arrangements.
So, why the difference? It took some time to dawn on me that the biggest difference between these couples, besides prior life experiences, was where they were from. You see like Alaska, Maine is known for collecting a . . . highly individual group of people (I would say odd, but since I’m also referring to myself, I’m trying to be nice!). I don’t consider myself a hippy, granola or any of the other multitude of slang terms often used to refer to Mainers. I’m just me, and I do happen to live on the slightly oddball side of the Maine spectrum of lifestyles (I know FAR more original though!).
What hadn’t occurred to me was that Maine is ALREADY on the far side of normal compared to the rest of the United States (and proud of it too!). So, that puts Raven and I somewhere to the far left of Andromeda I think as far as typical lifestyles go.
So really, I’m not working toward someday living a unique and adventurous life. I’m doing it! 🙂 I just hadn’t realized it until now.