R and I are just past the 2 month mark of our move to Kauai – wow how time flies! We thought that living in Hawaii would slow us down a little bit, get us (ok mostly me) to relax a little, but so far that has not been the case. We did move here primarily for a work opportunity for Richard and to try living in a new place with a different culture than anything we were used to in Colorado. We wanted a little adventure in our life story and what better way to start a new chapter than with a move to a tropical oasis?
For R, this new chapter has brought on a lot of work with a lot more sweat. He is still a do-it-all and do-it-extremely well designer/contractor, but he has been spending anywhere from 6 to 10 hours per day, outside in the crazy heat and humidity crawling under and around this house, chasing electrical wire disasters, repairing shoddy plumbing and just generally fixing the janky additions to the main house. It is exhausting just watching him and a far cry from the basement remodels and kitchen finishes that he was used to in Colorado. It is amazing to see the transformation that this house has already gone through and I can’t wait to see the finished product and find out if we can sell it but more on that later.
The first two months here have been full of new things for me too. If you remember way back to the beginning of the blog I was graciously offered the opportunity to give remote work a try for my job in Colorado. It was a decent job (marketing for the University I went to for undergrad) and there were great days where I loved everything about it, but there were also days where all I wanted to do was run screaming from the building and never come back. Taking the offer to work remotely I thought that moving to this little green dot in the middle of the Pacific would help me find that initial joy I once had for the job and decrease the frequency of pull-out-my-hair-and-scream days, but those days were still there and still frequent. So when the terms of my full time employment were up at the end of August and I was supposed to move into a part time position, I decided that it was best if I declined the temporary work offer and tried to find something else new to fit into this little story about life.
It’s hard to walk away from something that has been part of how you introduce yourself for so long. “What do you do? I work for a university admissions office where I manage email marketing design and communication” is no longer part of my casual conversation and that is weird. I went to college for four years and worked at the university six, so 10 years of my 28 were shaped by that place and the people there. Even on the most frustrating days it was (and still is) so much a part of who I am and what I am capable of. For that I will always be thankful. So with the decision not to extend the position made final, I packed up my bags and headed to Honolulu for one final event as Tessa, Assistant Director of Communications and Marketing. It was a fitting way to end my position since the first event I ever did as an employee was of the same variety just in a different state.
What was really great about timing of everything and the presentation in Honolulu was that it gave Richard and I the chance to island hop and check out the big city for a few days. We stayed in Honolulu for a night and then stayed two nights at my aunt’s house in Kaneohe. We had a blast and fit in a crazy amount of tourist activities. We shopped, dined along Waikiki Beach, visited Pearl Harbor, Byodo-in Temple and the Polynesian Cultural Center, ate Round Table pizza (I was obsessed with this pizza the first time I visited Oahu. It’s good, but not as mind-bending as my 14 year old self remembers) kayaked the bay and had a little time at Kailua beach before catching our late flight back to Kauai. The trip was great but didn’t leave a lot of time to consider how I would answer the question, “What do you do?” now.
I’d love to say that I have a fabulous answer to that question now, but I’m not sure I do just yet. For now I’m spending the days working on my master’ thesis, (proposal is currently under review by my committee at a whopping 42 pages in length and that’s just the proposal!) working on a few freelance marketing projects and deciding if I want to make a go of this freelance situation full time and start my own LLC (shameless plug here. . . Have any marketing or design needs? I’m your gal!), and keeping an eye on job postings and tracking down contact information for people in places I’d like to work. Also trying to enjoy this little green dot in the Pacific just a little.
They went west 