Starting Is Easy. Ending Is Hard.

[flwyd]

Some thoughts kicking around my head after a conversation today. The ideas aren't new to me, but I think this is an interesting way to phrase them. Perhaps you'll find it helpful too.

When something's really bad, it's easy to make the decision to end it. Think of all the TV shows that get canceled after a pilot or two.

When something's really good, but has a clear time structure, bringing it to the right end is a situation for celebration and pride. Think of your favorite miniseries.

What's hard is deciding to end something that's got some good bits, got some bad bits, and not a lot of new excitement. Think of a TV show that was amazing when it first aired, but hasn't had a brilliant episode in a few seasons. Or think of the great movies that spawned a string of terrible sequels.

Mexican soap operas last six months and then end. U.S. soap operas go on for decades. Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side ran for less than 15 years. How long have Prince Valiant and Mary Worth been in print?

It's important to periodically take stock of your major commitments and decide if they're worth continuing. "The status quo is okay" versus "Maybe there's something much more awesome" is a tough call. The former is certain, the latter much less so. Sometimes you go in search of greater and grander and find out what you had before was actually pretty good. Other times, you look back and wonder why you stayed in Lameville for so long.



Incidentally, I decided on a date to leave my job. April 3rd, give or take a week, will be my last day working for Eagle. (I've been saying I'm leaving for two years now, so it's time to rip off the tape, dammit.) The next stop is Central America for a couple months. Then I'll have the summer to find a more awesome job and go camping a bunch. Some people say it's a bad time to not have a job. I say it's a great time to visit a third world country.

Comments

[flwyd.livejournal.com]

I've never been to a place where English isn't widely spoken but I can understand what people say. I was pretty good at Spanish in high school, but I haven't really used it since. A couple years ago, I thought "Hey, it'd be cool to go to South America some January so I can speak Spanish, dance tango, and minimize the amount of time I spend in the cold winter." About a year later, mollybzz said "Hey, I just got offered a job teaching English in China." So that winter (i.e., earlier that year), I spent a month of winter in southern China (which, while it featured a couple cold nights in drafty rooms at high elevations also featured eating palm fruits in the tropics), an adventure that I hadn't even considered 9 months before.

Several months ago, I asked Molly "Hey, what would you think about spending a winter in South America?" As a fluent Spanish speaker who lived in the Dominican Republic for two years, fondly remembered a certain monkey in the Amazon basin, and had spent the last year frustrated at communication challenges in a country with a billion people, she said "¡Sí!"

As we started talking about ideas for destinations, she suggested that exploring Mayan ruins in Guatemala and diving off the coast of Honduras would also be fun. Since neither of us had an overriding desire for anything specific besides speaking Spanish and eating exotic fruits, we figured Central America would be just as good as South America and somewhat cheaper (airfare-wise at least). As an added benefit, Guatemala's tropical climate means we could be angsty and plan-challenged, delaying travel past the months of ideal southern summer weather. Of course, the rainy season will start in late April, so we may end up spending lots of time socializing with villagers while our mud-soaked clothes dry. But hey, I've never been anywhere that was raining more than a busy June in Colorado, so it's another new experience.

So, in summary, I decided to go to Central America because I wanted to speak Spanish and meet folks in small villages in warm weather.