Three Years

In June, 2015, recovering from surgery, I interviewed for an accounting position at the Art Institute of Chicago. A month later I was offered the job and began working in a 10th floor office across the street from the museum.  I have experienced much during the past 38 months and last week I put in my notice, with my final day at the museum being Friday, September 7th, 2018.

I have managed to keep my health even though my body is moving quickly to its end point. I am 52 years old but have aged considerably during the past decade. As far as I am concerned the time currently passing me by is gravy, something not meant for me, and yet, here I am.

On October 1, 2015, I moved into a studio apartment on the north side of Chicago in the Lakeview neighborhood, a few blocks from Wrigley Field and a couple of blocks from the lake. One of my more pleasant memory segments was walking and biking to work along the lakeshore path, a 12 mile round trip journey. 

In 2016 I met Megan at an Evanston chess tournament and we became friends and eventual roommates, moving together, in late 2016, into a downtown Chicago, 15th floor condo next door to the Fairmont Hotel on Columbus Drive,  a couple of blocks away from Millennium Park and half mile from the museum. My walks to work have thus become considerably shorter.

However, I won't have to worry about that after this week because during the past three years I have been putting my monk habits to use, which means I rarely felt a need to spend money, and so it went into savings. Having started with $200 in July, 2015, I now have $23,400, enough to last me 21 months.

I am planning, for reasons unknown, to reconstruct my trip from 2012 - Chiang Mai and Bangkok in Thailand, Sanur in Bali, and perhaps a new country during the final month of the trip. Unlike the 2012 journey, which was open ended, my new travels will have a fixed time frame - November 26, 2018 - March 19, 2019, a 16 week adventure of the spirit. I will spend the first month in Chiang Mai, move south to Bangkok, then fly to Sanur, Bali for another month, followed by the final segment wandering new regions in Thailand or another country in Asia. I will need to get back to Chiang Mai in mid-March so that I can take the return flight back to Chicago. Upon arrival in Chicago I plan to decompress and rest for a few months and then begin looking for a new job, hopefully beginning to work in September, 2019.

So for the next year I have thrown off the fetters of a working life and will once again journey into unknown regions of space and time.