Deflated

I have never had to look so hard for employment. Ever. I've always been a few steps ahead of myself with plans spanning the horizon, not jumping ship until the next stage was ready to launch. It worked great. I was willing to accept rather sucky and poorly paying jobs simply because someone was willing to pay me to learn a few things I was dying to learn. They accepted my curious novice status, I accepted a meagre paycheck for the privilege paid learning. It was awesome and eventually, through careful budgeting and frugal spending, paid my way through months and hard, draining, colorful, spectacular, unbelievable months of overseas travel. An absolute and long-standing dream realized, a burning itch scratched, a hopefully lifetime journey finally launched. But my long lists of two and five year plans aren't working so well anymore.

I knew this was coming. I could sense it at the farm even two years ago. I had quit school with the goal of working and travelling and learning a few things along the way. And I did. I became, fulfilling a minor dream, a bike mechanic. I, partially satisfying a nagging curiosity, worked on an organic farm for a while. I absorbed an unfathomable amount of information during the past five or so years. I now know a dozen kinds of wrenches - and how to use them. I've taught myself to knit and quilt. I can build bicycle wheels, straighten bent frames, and adjust any derallieur with the best of 'em. I've read hundreds of cookbooks and can make anything from gluten free pies, endless stir-fries, a half dozen risottos, baguettes. Seeing as how I grew up on TV Dinners and I had never before purchased fresh produce before I was an adult, I consider this a major accomplishment.

The past five years have been a blast. Bunnyholes heading off in a dozen directions and enough enthusiasm to chase them all to their ends. I could hardly go fast enough, learn quick enough, read enough, try enough new recipes or ethnic grocery stores.

But I must admit I'm sick of shitty paychecks. I'm tired of moving every few months on the tail of a new occupation. Of never unpacking all my hard-won kitchen stuff and using those baguette pans again. The life of the nomad is romantic. And exhausting. A bone wearying exhaustion.

I said in the beginning I'd do this until it wasn't fun anymore. The trips are still fun and I still have trip ideas bursting out of my brain - a self supported bike tour to Maine, months WWOOFing in Ireland, France, Spain and Greece, a bike tour through New Zealand, more SCUBA in Thailand. I could go on until the cows come home. But it's the in-between stuff that's not fun anymore. I'm tired of living in crowded boxes full of boxes, of riding a bike all through sloppy frigid MN winters, of always buying the least expensive item of dinner menus.

Most importantly, I'm tired of the nonexistence of opportunities for someone of my skill set. First, I'm a woman, with no secretarial training, and that leaves few options for the under educated. I'm a bike mechanic by trade with some experience in organic farming and nanny work. There is no room for advancement, little room for growth. It seems like all that's left is to keep doing exactly what I have been doing - fixing flat tires or picking broccoli or changing diapers. It's not that there aren't jobs to be had, it's just that I don't want to do any of them. I'm experiencing a general malaise, an over arching unhappiness with the situation I've created for myself. It's time to think in new directions and that keeps pointing one direction - back to school. Eeeek. But even that has no guarantees. Most of the people I've worked with in shops were doing the exact same thing I was doing for the same paycheck - only they had degrees. Let me tell you, there's not a lot of motivation for taking on more debt simply to prove I can do it. But I'm tired of my other options. Are there more opportunities I'm missing here because I feel really, really stuck.

I want a house. I want a garden - a big ass garden - and chickens. I want to comb the farmer's markets and freeze enough locally grown tomatoes, peppers, broccoli, leeks, sweet corn, blueberries, and strawberries to get me through the long winter months. I want some predictability, some continuity, some stability in my life. I want a better life than the wages of the perpetual novice can afford.

Is this wrong?

And more importantly will I regret leaving the life of the nomad behind?