2013 was the year of many events, I got the chance to work on festivals that I’ve always wanted to attend or have some roll with, and this was the time to do it. Music festivals are a lucrative business and I’m glad I’ve had the opportunity to work some of the really big ones to get some good perspective on what I do for a living.
My route to where I’m living now was a bit of a trial, not as bad as my trip home from Qatar in 2012, but definitely more time consuming. In August I was offered a position in Toronto with the Pan American Games in Logistics, a department I’ve worked in the last four games I’ve been involved with for the OCOG, to get me to Toronto I had to travel from Seattle to San Francisco back to Seattle and then from Seattle to West Virginia to Toronto. All the travel had me working in those cities prior to getting to Toronto and starting with the Pan American Games.
Moving to Toronto was the first time in the last seven years that I decided to ship a lot of my things from Seattle and setup house, things like my kitchen items, and some other comforts came with me. It’s the little things that I brought that make me happy and make my apartment feel more like a home. I have my time zone map in my office, art from the Woodland Park Zoo (a reminder of all the work I had done with them over the years), photos of places I’ve traveled as a reminder to keep mobile and enjoy everything life throws at me, and the most important items being kitchen implements.
I have plans now that I’ve moved to Toronto and close the chapter on part of my life that was Seattle. I want to go back someday, but I feel more at home in Canada than I do in the States, which leads me to the notion of getting either an extension on my work visa or applying for permanent residency here. Of course a lot depends on what I’m going to do for work, since the question is not if I’ll move again, but when I move again. What will that mean for me? Will I keep working in the events industry or will I vie for a desk job to have a little more permanence in my life? I don’t think a desk job suits me; I’m more at home traveling and doing events than being chained to a desk. I know my friends and family would appreciate my being in one place for a longer period of time, but what would that mean for my career? I keep asking myself these questions about this path that I’m on and what does that mean for my future? Do I keep bouncing from one role to another or do I try and settle for something more permanent?
I answer that question with a question, if I settle what form does that take? Do I get married again, buy a house and raise a family? Or do I stay nomadic? Being a nomad means you gravitate towards other nomadic people, almost as though you can smell each other out when sitting down at a bar somewhere. I have several friends who have done a hybrid of the nomadic lifestyle; married couples that travel with their families wherever the work takes them. Personally I would love that version, but finding someone who shares that vision of life poses its own challenges. How can you ask someone to uproot their lives to run around the world working in sometimes crazy places to do events and have a time limit on you’re being employed?
Asking that question of someone is tough, and it’s usually an unfair question as well. Most normal humans like to be secure in where they put their heads; they like the stability of going to a job they know will keep being there. I’m the exact opposite, I thrive on the unknown, I love traveling for work and the adventures that can be had by meeting new people and going somewhere I’ve not been before.
I wasn’t always this way, just ask my parents! They joke that I feared change and I liked things a certain way. Well I’ve kept the trait of liking things a certain way, but now I embrace the changes that new adventure brings.
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