So I went to California for about a week to visit friends. Had a ton of fun. Got to see people I hadn’t seen in almost a year, and a couple I hadn’t seen for over a year. I even drove on 101 during rush hour traffic and was unperturbed. Despite this, I’m suffering a deep bout of depression.

Now, I can’t be the only person in the world who gets mildly depressed after a vacation and leaving friends. In fact, I’m positive this happens about hourly at every airport worldwide. My issue other than that is why does visiting there make me feel like moving to Colorado was the worst thing I have ever done? Why did saying goodbye to my friends feel like my soul was being slowly fed feet first into a wood chipper?  I absolutely love Colorado. The weather changes with the seasons and we get snow/rain, the cost of living is super affordable, the population density is much less. All reasons I wanted to move away from California, but 1 week there and I want to go back.

The one thing that holds me back is what is tearing me apart: I love my job. Pretty much every second of it. It has traversed from being classified as “work” to “something to go do for 8 hours that you enjoy doing.” I turn 27 this year, and who can say they’ve reached this point in life that they can say that? Who can say they’ve ever reached this point? Its this one fact that is a giant brick wall falling across a 8 lane highway that all my thoughts crash into. Sure, I’d give up where I live, the climate, the cost of living and adjust to that, but this job is awesome. Unless I’m let go it would be retarded of me to leave unless offered the same position elsewhere, which does not exist.

Normally I’d think this statement sounds massively emo, but it seems to actually apply. I cannot be truly happy. There will always be something blocking me from this goal. There will always be some reason to make everything appear perfect on the outside, but a festering rotten shit heap in the middle. I’d come to terms with not ever being totally content with life, I know I’m not going to have everything I’ve ever wanted or do things I’ve always wanted a long time ago. Despite this epiphany a while ago, I’m horribly allergic to it.

Those of you who know me would not believe this statement, but I would willingly sell off most of my possessions on Craigslist just to move back, but that would only get me there and might allow me to couch surf for maybe a few months, and I’d no longer have the job I’ve wanted forever, ever again. I’m kind of babbling at this point, though. There might be a job like this somewhere else at another company, but it will never be the exact same job.

Monday morning when I finally got back to work after the vacation, I was just totally numb. My delayed emotional response set in finally, and weighed in on the real feeling of depression. It didn’t help that I had a performance review for the year that basically consisted of 4 managers’ worth of feedback. One of them wasn’t with the company anymore. Another was against my constant questioning of the process and trying to streamline it and make it better, and wondered why I was so enraged when I was asked to repeat about 2 weeks of work after my checking with him and the team to ensure I was doing my given task correctly. Thankfully, the 2 managers that could give direct feedback both knew me and understood me enough to help my current manager have a better picture of the situation, and his experience with me being in my dream job has been sunshine and roses anyway. So as a result I got an average review, despite the fact that I was one of the 6 people who picked up and moved my life over to establish the best support center globally in our company. None of that ever means shit apparently.

I think everyone on the road home that evening was going 10 under the limit, but snippets of this entry kept running through my mind, and I just didn’t care. Tuesday was just an overall numb feeling too. Not caring. Just sleepwalking through the day getting stuff done, but not really feeling it.I got really tired at 8 PM though, and went to bed. Woke back up at 3 AM, and felt I should type this up.

Well this is getting long. So I’m going to wrap it up as succinctly as I can. I love living in Colorado, and I love my job here, but I don’t think I can live away from all my friends for much longer. I might look at what I’d need to do to move back.