seattle

It's so strange, how this city keeps coming up again and again. Talking with a high school friend a few weeks ago, she mentioned how she plans to move there to study her MBA in two or three years. Several of other high school friends have also relocated there and bought houses, so it appears they'd be there for at least a while. I emailed a college friend to catch up a few days ago, and she replied that she's moving from Singapore to Seattle the very next day!

With so many of my best of friends there (the only other American city with more friends would be Pittsburgh), I wish that's the next place we can go. Daniel's applied for a faculty position at one of the universities there, but the chance of him actually getting the position in this dismal job market is bleak. I can't help but feel a little resentful by how I'm no longer as mobile or free to make my own decisions about what to do or where to go. Ideally, I would live in either Taiwan or somewhere on the West Coast. But my husband's a more Midwestern or East Coast kind of guy. One of the things I asked him about when he asked me to marry him was whether or not we could one day live in Taiwan, because it's where I feel like I most belong. He said yes. And on that count, I had agreed to marry him. And then it seemed like, once he "got" me, my life has become a series of giving up things that matter a great deal to me...all for the sake of pleasing him.

Of course it makes me sad. Sometimes, marriage feels like one big shackle.