October 18, 2003
With my DVDs and magazines finally moved out of the apartment in Australia and sitting in boxes at the DHL shipment center going through customs, I can (or will soon be able to) fully put behind me the mistake that was my second engagement and reflect on the last year and everything that has happened to me since then.
October 2002 - Early November
Getting off the plane in Newark, I still felt the heaviness from the recent events. A person had completely pushed me out of her life, and never wanted to see me again. Fair enough. This did not mean that I had to stop living. I had an apartment already waiting for me in peaceful Highland Park, New Jersey, home of a lovely Jewish community. I was to be living in the basement of a house where a young family made their residence upstairs, sharing one room with them - that being the computer room. It ended up being my favorite room in the house, which was not much of a surprise for me.
As October came to a close, I started thinking about participating in the National Novel Writing Month - an incredibly clever contest where the entire point is to write an original novel of 50,000 words or more in the month of November. Winning the contest is as simple as writing a novel of the minimum length in the time period provided. There are no prizes to be won in the contest, but the winners get their names listed on a section of the site. I had a few ideas for what I wanted to write about, and told the wife of the household about the site and the contest. She seemed to think it was a nice idea.
Meanwhile, I started to get a little stir crazy. Something that I picked up on quickly while living in New York is that I never really liked living in suburban areas. As wonderful as it must be for some people to live in areas with the big houses with their garages, the SUVs parked nicely in the driveway, it is something I abhor to no end. I particularly loathe the SUVs. Generally speaking, I don't like the idea of being confined to only being able to drive somewhere if I want to get anywhere - driving has always been somewhat of an annoyance to me.
On top of all of this, I was having difficulty sleeping at night, and during the day I tried to force myself to find work but had no luck whatsoever. A temp agency I had worked for was extremely unhappy with me for obvious reasons - I had just suddenly left the country without giving too much notice. They didn't want to have anything to do with me. I was sending out resumes left and right with no responses.
I hoped that perhaps if I lived in the city once more it would at least brighten my spirits and bring me some happiness, to be in my favorite city in the world. To be able to go to my favorite synagogue of choice - Ohab Zedek, between Columbus and Amsterdam on 95th Street. I felt that I knew people there, and that there were people there that genuinely cared about me. To be certain, the two main rabbis - Rabbi Schwartz and Rabbi Steinberg - made an effort to help me in whatever way they could and were always very generous with their time, sometimes even inviting me into their homes for a festive meal. I contacted my former roommate and asked if it would be possible to come back at a fraction of the rent for a while until I found some serious work that would enable me to be able to pay the full rent. He was okay with it, which was a great relief to me at the time as I was eager to get back to Manhattan.
November 11 2002 - February 16, 2003
I was somehow dim-witted enough to find myself in the middle of yet another long distance relationship from right when I settled back in New York. One would think that I would have certainly learned my lesson about how disastrous long distance relationships could be based on the travesty of a mockery of a sham which took place over a half a year period in 2002. However, it was clear that I had not suffered enough, so I gave it another go. This relationship involved extensive traveling, mostly on my part.
It was not a bad relationship per se - the person I was involved with was brilliant in every sense of the word and probably knew me better than anyone I have ever dated. We were just fundamentally incompatible on some level and we were both too stubborn to do something about it, I guess. Regardless of this, it somehow entered into my head that it would be a fantastic idea to teach public school in Ohio, and so I was going to be going to get the degree and certification necessary to do so. Meanwhile, however, since my knowledge of my own religion could always use work, it was decided that rather than futilely search for temp work, I should instead go over to peaceful Monsey, New York to the Ohr Somayach Yeshiva.
Monsey, of course, is a nice, peaceful place - home of a lovely Jewish community. Peaceful, with rows of recently built large homes with SUV's in the driveway. You can almost imagine how pleased I was to be there. As I have stated in an earlier article, it was absolutely necessary for me to go there in order to realize what was really missing from my life.
February 17-Present
The stay in Monsey was often quite a pleasant one, particularly when I was spending time with the families of the community that felt quite so at home there. Most of the people that I got along with the best had dual lives - they worked in Manhattan, and then came home here to this alternate reality. Then again, perhaps I was the only one who felt like such a foreigner there.
Yes, it is true, at some point I thought that I would get rabbinical ordination. I thought that this was surely the best thing to do in terms of a career. I wanted to help people out, to be there for people the way that Rabbi Schwartz and Rabbi Steinberg are there for people who need them. I thought that I surely could make a difference in the lives of people. But then I thought, is that what I am really trying to do here? Make a difference in the lives of people? Or am I really trying to just support myself while I work on getting my work published and, to some degree, recognized such that the writing will be the only thing that I do? Isn't it really my dream to be sitting in an apartment with a great view of Central Park, working on a screenplay that I would direct, having a cup of tea? What was I doing thinking of moving to Cleveland, Ohio of all places?
Of course, by the time I was having these thoughts I had long since broken up with the person in question for other reasons. Nevertheless, I felt that the time had come to return to the city that I loved once more, this time for keeps! A friend of mine graciously offered to host me while I pursued work. I, overwhelmed with gratitude, accepted.
Conclusion
Since then, things have been fairly calm. I have been looking for work and
working on a couple of novels - one of which is being published serially here in
GO INSIDE Magazine, the other of which was started last November as a part of the contest. There's always this November to try and win that contest once more.
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