I have more and more things in my life and it frightens me. When I first came back to the US I had a backpack, a saxophone, and a suitcase. These were all my possessions, plus some memorabilia stored in my parents’ house in Florida. Yesterday my cousin gave me a monitor (I carried it on the BART from San Jose). I also, very reluctantly, received a bed-frame from my old housemate when they were moving out. Same with a desk, and a dresser. And heck I guess I bought coat hangers. Things are getting a little crazy.

Why is it all frightening? I don’t know – for 5 months I wandered the Eastern hemisphere with just a backpack. I felt freedom, but also full accountability for who I am and where I was going. Like I’ve written about before, traveling was like being at the helm of a sailboat – captain, in a sense, but also subject to the whims of the ocean (in the case of traveling, it was bus timings, vegan food availability, hostel noise levels). Now in many ways I have more stability – I have things, some would even say nice things (like this monitor I’m typing into). I think I feel like I have more to lose. Like one day everything could go snap and disappear.

I joke with my friend Dean that sometimes I still feel like I’m backpacking. I did especially when I was living in Oakland, since there I had a three-month lease, and my desk was mostly a cardboard box on a folding picnic table. It worked in a pinch!

I initially decided to teach English abroad because… well, I don’t know. It seemed fun, I knew I liked teaching, I wanted to learn linguistics better, I wanted to learn another language. I didn’t know where it would all lead me. Like I said in the last semi-annual update, I didn’t “figure it out” when in Taiwan. I definitely came back with the same amount of questions.

I remember looking up other successful people who lived outside of the US in their early career. Some notable examples: JK Rowling, who taught in Portugal before writing Harry Potter; Steve Jobs, who did the whole hippie thing in India etc. before Apple; Reed Hastings, founder of Netflix, who taught in Swaziland through the Peace Corps; and Seth Goldman, who’s on the board of Beyond Meat. Anyways, you can see that it’s not just bums! Though there are plenty of those too.

What’s challenging is that the buck kinda stops here in terms of paths laid out for you. I mean, you could say that was the case after graduating high school, but in my life, I was always told I would go to college. But I was never told what I would do after college, and I was never told what I would do after living in Taiwan. I told myself I wanted to travel, so I did that. Then I told myself I wanted to try a routine, 9-5 life in the US, so I’m doing that.

I have a few great friends who have gone through this particular experience of 回國, returning to one’s home country. My old writing professor, Paula Varsano, did it first; after teaching English (also in Kaohsiung!) in the 1980s, she came back and pursued her PhD. My friend Leon came back and did numerous odd jobs before deciding that piano accompaniment was what he wanted to set his sights on. My friend Penny has just recently returned home, and she says she wants to be an art teacher.

All these paths are extremely wonderful, full of thought and deliberation. And, they are particular to the person; I wouldn’t do anyone good by copying them. That still begs the question, what do I do with my life? I’ve written about this question too. In 2022, I likened career moves to playing chess, a game where you can plan ahead and calculate but also have to trust your gut and go with what feels right. Another way to say it: use your compass, not a map. This feels right to me, but what do I know? I’m 25, still early on the journey.