What do you mean we get to choose?

Yes, the job applications are flying around our house like mad and it is raining resumes. Swiss is having A LOT more luck finding suitable jobs to apply for, but I'm doing my best to think outside the box... you wouldn't believe some of the jobs I am applying for! But the ancillary issue to all of this applying and submitting is choosing where to live. Goo- what a decision!

Yes- we get to choose. And not from a list of 4 Army-approved options. We are part HALLELUJAH! and part Holy Hell, we live in a HUGE country... how are we going to do this? It is great to have this much control over our lives, but it is also so very strange to think about moving someplace new, randomly (sorta) picking places that we think would be great to live in. Also, we are used to these military moves which are all pretty non-threatening: You know you have a built in support system, you know there will be a swell commissary, a job, a PX, and mostly, you are comforted by the tidy little bubble that living on Post affords you. It is a known entity, it is easy to adjust to, and really, how different can it be from the last Post you were stationed at?

But man, the real world is scary. There are towns that seem great but aren't all they are cracked up to be- and of course we won't know that until we accept jobs and move there. Fah. There are town that we might dismiss but are really pretty great but we will never know because they look funny on the maps in the atlas. There are towns/cities close to the ones we love, there are ones on either coast. There are big ones and tiny ones and Mormon ones and Hippie ones and Southern ones and Conservatives ones (Liberal ones too).

It all feels so arbitrary- looking at an atlas, Wikipedia, city/town web sites, flickr photos, whatever we can find to somehow determine wether or not it would be a good place to settle down. Without actually going there. Of course there will be the (hopefully) interviews wherein we would actually get to be Boots on the Ground in the cities on the list. But right now, as we shuffle through lists of cities with open jobs... it feels more like a bad game of drunken pin the tail on the donkey. And you know that never ends well.

Anyway, I just think it is so funny that way back when I was a single lady (yeah, you've got the song in your head now too- bonus points if you do the dance!) a prospect like this was exhillerating.... now, when two of us have to find jobs and we have a family (wow- when did that happen?) to think about, a dog who needs a big yard, a lifestyle that doesn't romanticize schmancy apartment loft living, insane commutes or ridiculous work hours... I find it intimidating and exhausting.

I know there is time yet, and going in for interviews will give us a chance to really get the vibe of the towns/cities. That will make all the difference in the world... but when a job posting with 18 different cities you think you would like makes you narrow it down to 4? Bring me some more wine!!!