On Monday, everything in our Stillwater home was boxed and packed up. On Tuesday, I rushed home directly after my spin class to quickly shower and eat there for the last time. By 8 that morning we began loading the moving truck, cramming it full of the valuables Max and I have oh-so-carefully (or not) collected over the past 10 years together. (I didn't even have time to prune the pile - spring cleaning was going to happen much later this year!) 

A few short hours later found us in Edmond in our new digs, beginning the reverse process of unloading and determining new hidey-holes for all our things. It was an excruciatingly long day... In the past our moves have taken us as long as two weeks to fully accomplish. Never have we done it all at once! I planned the move for Monday/Tuesday so that it would land right at the beginning of my recovery week. What a recovery! By the end of Tuesday my legs hurt worse than I could ever have imagined.

But the new house is worth it. The kitchen is a tad bit smaller and I'm not a fan of the cabinets at all. Finding new places for my kitchen cookery has been a pain. But the windows! Oh, we finally have light again! A big, beautiful deck that runs out from the kitchen (and not our friggin bedroom this time), a coat closet, a big, beautiful space for my computer and my bikes, brilliant location and easy access to open roads and plenty of riding and running miles, easy commute for Max, both Cafe Evoke and Sprouts right down the street... even though the house is still an absolute wreck, we couldn't be happier.

I miss my friends and my cycling family in Stillwater more than you can imagine. I never thought I'd say this, but Stillwater grew on me. Somewhere in the past 5 years it started feeling less like a place to go to college and more like a home. I love you all. Holler anytime you're in town! Perhaps we can get coffee :)

So many of you have asked me, why now? Did you get a job? Are you finally done?

To answer all of your questions... Not exactly.

Max got a promotion at his job earlier this year. And with it came bigger responsibilities and an absolute need to be closer to the site. Moving closer, and soon, was imperative.

I am not finished with schooling, though I am finishing up at Oklahoma State. Somewhere along the way this past year, it really began to hit me that I was no longer doing what I wanted to be doing. I would look at my advisor, or my friends who were also pursuing a Ph.D. in the same field, and it finally hit me: I didn't have their passion. I had tried faking it for too long now, but it just wasn't there. I still love optics and photonics and playing with laser systems, don't get me wrong! I even still have a great love of laboratory research and with any luck, I'll still get to do that. But pursuing this career path at the Ph.D. level no longer felt right to me. The time required to finish up was gradually getting longer... and longer... and longer... and I was really starting to A) stress out in a very unhealthy way and B) no longer care about the project. In fact, I just wanted to run and hide from it.

So after much soul searching, and some major, seriously above-and-beyond support from my loved ones and friends and family, I decided to cut and run. I am now finishing with a Master's degree instead. My original passion, the pursuit of something more bio-med focused, is now what I hope to get into. I won't get into the why or how of why I didn't go that route in the first place - sometimes life throws curveballs and you roll with them and hope for the best. In this case, it turns out that in the end it didn't exactly work out. That's okay. I am going to be okay. Now that we're in Edmond, I have access to the great medical and biomed programs at OU. Yes, it'll mean even more schooling, but changing it up into something I want to really, really do, I've learned, is actually absolutely worth it. I don't plan on trying to persue a Ph.D. again, at least for now. Another Master's will be fine, as long as I can get my foot in the door and, like I said, hopefully work in a research laboratory again.

So that's it. That's my story. That's why Max and I have finally uprooted our comfortable life in Stilly for something new in Edmond. New city... new beginnings. Wish us luck!