Making the "irresponsible choice"

Since this is my first blog post here, I guess I should write about what I want to write about and what I want this blog to be.

It started about two years ago when I decided that I would finally move to Vancouver. My mam is originally from Vancouver, and while I visited Vancouver when I was very young and spent some time there, I never really felt like I was there long enough to ever call it home. I've always felt out of place in Dublin so I kind of harbored this theory that Vancouver was where I should have grown up.

When I finally decided I wanted to start making the move to Vancouver I had just finished my Masters degree in Gender, Sexuality and Culture. When I mentioned my idea to my partner, he wasn't surprised that I wanted to move but asked me to give him another year so that he could try to get a career break from his job rather than quit it. I agreed and applied for a variety of teaching positions and was accepted as an English and History teacher (and later on, a German teacher as well!) at a local school. I figured that I would take this year as an opportunity to gain experience in this field and thoroughly examine this as an option.

I was surprised to find that I really enjoyed teaching full-time. During my PGDE (Post-graduate diploma in Education) I had a very unpleasant experience and walked away from it thinking that I could never see myself in that career. This change of perspective wasn't all that positive when I realized that it would be very easy for me to stay in Ireland and settle into teaching, in essence, to not move to Canada. My partner has a full-time, steady and well-paying job. Now I did too. Playing it safe would have been easy. It's what most people would've done, particularly in the middle of a recession.

However, instead of being responsible adults and staying put, we decided to go through with it. We decided that we would make the "irresponsible choice" and move to another country and I declined to have my contract renewed for the following term and  booked my flights to Vancouver.

There are a number of reasons that contributed to me making this decision, but first and foremost was that fact that I simply really wanted to go. Not because I am unhappy here in Dublin and I really want to make that clear. Dublin is a fantastic place to live, the people here are amazing and I have made friends here that have shaped me into the person I am today. There are jobs, although they're hard to find. The weather is unpredictable, but that makes for half the fun. People in Ireland enjoy life and live it to the full. However, I don't know any other way of living. I don't know that what I have here is enough for me, because I have never had anything else. I don't know if teaching is right for me, because I haven't tried anything else. I don't want to wake up in thirty years thinking, what if? So that's why I'm making this irresponsible choice: In a bid to live my life with as few regrets as I can. Because if you don't take any risks, you don't really know how to live.

Right now, I'm trying to make the most of Dublin in my last remaining two months by spending time with friends, trying new things and writing a lot. My partner is waiting to hear if he has a career break or not, but either way he'll leave his position at the end of the summer and we both will jet off to beautiful Vancouver.

I plan to use this blog to write about our experience from planning to move, to packing, to setting off and landing, to finding jobs and apartments and making friends. It's a way to keep my family and friends updated, while hopefully helping anyone else who is making a big move.

Thanks for reading :)
 ~ Sarah ~