Living on Tulsa time

It's really odd to be back in Tulsa.

The wedding is Saturday, but I flew in on Thursday evening. There's a couple of things I need to take care of stateside, so I figured I'd take the extra day for some errands.

I drove past the campus on my way in from the airport. It was unbelievably surreal. It felt like there's still a part of me home there, but the rest of me is settled so happily in Vancouver. It felt like 100 years since I'd been there last. Graduation feels like a long distant memory.

I've traveled thousands of miles and moved my life to a new country since then.

That's crazy.

It's crazy, right?

Who does that? Who just moves to a new country IMMEDIATELY after graduating college. Not even taking time to breathe or adjust. Simply high-tailing it out of there.

Things are slower in Tulsa. The world is a little smaller there. It's a great college town and a great place to raise kids. It's a place many people I know are happy to live the rest of their lives. It's one of the largest cities in the States, believe it or not. Still growing, with a vibrant music scene and more young adults every day. But it's definitely slower. It's a life that allows for vacations and family time. It's a nice life.

It's calming to be back, if only for a few days.

This land is your land

I’m flying back to the states today. Barely here a week and already on my way back south. Max made the comment, and I completely know where he’s coming from, that it feels as though we were only visiting Jake in Vancouver, and now we’re heading home, back to the real world.

This certainly still feels like something out of a fairy tale. I always wanted to study abroad as a college kid. I never got around to it, but even that wouldn’t have been as real as this. Only it lacks the real feeling. We’re spending money to make it happen. Our names are on the lease. We’ve put in time and energy into decorating the apartment and making it feel like home. We’ve attained visas and paid electric bills. But there’s just something odd about the whole thing. Inexplicably odd.

It’s one of the things you grow up talking about, with the deep seeded expectation that no one you know will actually make it happen. Moving to a different country goes against all the family values growing up in the south teaches you. Leaving your family behind, choosing a country other than the US, it’s all taboo. Everyone talks about how cool it would be, moving somewhere else. Being the foreign twenty something. Exploring a new city off on your own, getting to know its secrets and its treasures. Becoming a native. You all know it won’t happen. No one has that kind of courage or defiance toward their family. We’re all expected to graduate and move into one of the hip townhomes just across the highway so our moms can bring house gifts and baked lasagnas on Sunday.

But we’re doing it. We’re in the foreign country. We’re finding cool new restaurants and making friends. We’ve broken out of the norm and set out on our own. It’s overwhelming and it’s thrilling. It still doesn’t feel real. I still lose my breath every morning at the sheer sight out the window. The mountains and the huge city and the ocean. It’s unbelievable. This can’t be our life. This can’t be our next step after Tulsa. How did this come to pass and how on earth are we going to get away with it continuing?

This is ours. Wow.