Change of Plans

My wife was recently offered a year-long fellowship in Syracuse, New York. She started the application process back in April and we didn’t know what her chances were or when we might know for sure if she would get it. At that point, I was still in the middle of my internship at Air and Space and hadn’t really thought too far ahead towards my next internship or what the fellowship might do to our short term life plans. In June, about the time I was finishing up at NASM, she was invited for a phone interview with the director of the fellowship and then shortly afterwards invited for a second phone interview with the team of graduate students already on the project. At this point, it started to seem like there was a real possibility that she would get the fellowship, which prompted us to start thinking about what the opportunity would mean for us.

The possibility of her (and eventually me) moving to Syracuse caused me to do some rethinking of my academic plan. As I’ve mentioned earlier, at the end of my internship at NASM, I was mentally exhausted from the long days and long hours that resulted from me juggling school, work, and an internship. I was really dreading jumping back into a crazy schedule again and was silently hoping for a reason to not have to start until at least the fall.

In addition, after a couple of weeks in a normal schedule, I realized how much happier I was when I was not tired and anxious all the time. There was definitely a marked improvement in our home relationship as well now that we had time to talk to each other and do things together.

So I started thinking, that if the fellowship worked out, perhaps I would delay my graduation until May 2011, finish my coursework this fall, and then finish my final internship in the Syracuse area next Spring. I was keeping my fingers crossed that we would get some good news!

And finally, with just three weeks until the start of the fellowship, my wife was offered the position!

It’s pretty crazy to think that she will be leaving so soon and it will definitely be a challenge to be apart so much of the time. Especially since we haven’t been married that long and we haven’t been apart more than a couple of weeks in the last 3 years. But it is an amazing career opportunity for her and after it ends, it puts us in a much better place to make some decisions about what to do next (on our radar is a year-long working holiday in New Zealand, a relocation to Portland or Denver, or her enrolling in a PhD program somewhere).

Now my job is to find an internship in the Syracuse area. I’ve already emailed my advisors to see if they have any recommendations and to find out about the process of doing my internship away from DC, and now I’m just waiting to hear back.

I think until then, a Google search will be the best place to start.