Time Goes On: Thoughts And Reflections On MyThird Decade Of Life

Today is my 30th birthday.

There, I said it.  I have survived on Earth while it has rotated around the sun 31 times.  I have survived 18 years under my parents' roof, four years at college, including a semester in Europe, and eight years of somehow, some way being able to provide for myself while still receiving amazing support from my parents and extended family.  I have managed to receive an undergraduate and master's degree, have been immersed in two different career fields, have friends and family spread all throughout the country as well as internationally, and have managed to do all this with no real blueprint as to how to do so.

All and all, I'd say these first 30 years have gone by pretty well.

And so, I'd like to take this particular blog to note some of the highlights of my previous decade.  It was hard to narrow down the list of amazing experiences I've had from 2004 to 2014 but I felt the need to do so to help me reflect on my life thus far.  I can honestly say that I had no idea I'd be where I am today at age 30.  I had hoped that I'd be settled down by now with a child in hand.  That ship has sailed so I've finally realized that life happens and it gets in the way of, well, life.  You can't give yourself a set timeline to accomplish things because if you do you either force things or feel like a failure if you don't achieve them.  Going into my 30's, I hope to keep an open mind and to expect the unexpected because if you had told me that my 20's would have looked like they did at age 19, I never would have believed you.  That being said, here are some gems from my roaring 20's, which came to an end early this morning.

A Spanish Adventure - My 20's started out by spending four months attending Spain's oldest university, La Universidad de Salamanca.  In addition to taking classes and living with a host family, I was able to travel all throughout Spain and even ventured to Paris, Italy, and Portugal for international experiences.  My semester abroad not only improved my Spanish and helped land me two teaching jobs, but it also gave me enduring friendships that were forged by club hopping at 4 AM in the city that never sleeps.  The abroad experience taught me that even if you don't know where exactly you're going (literally and figuratively) as long as you project and air of confidence, people will just let you be.  Good advice for any travelers, both foreign and domestic.

A College Graduate - Upon returning from abroad, I rejoined the life of a college student which consisted of studying, boozing, and chasing women in that order.  Despite irreplaceable liver damage from my fraternity days and an unpaid internship my last semester (read:  student teaching) I somehow, some way managed to graduate with honors from one of the most rigorous and demanding colleges in the country.  Obviously, the fact I was an education major helped my GPA, but I also made a conscientious effort not to "waste a buttload of my parent's money" as the great Van Wilder once said.  I definitely worked hard and partied hard and I feel that my grades were justified by the good social life I was able to have at college.  Do I have regrets?  Sure, everybody does.  But by and large, I felt I made the most of my college experience.

The Other Side of Public Education - I grew up as a privileged White male.  For the first twenty-two years of my life I had no idea this was even a thing.  It was not until my first teaching job that I realized that not everybody had the same educational opportunities as I did growing up.  My first teaching job at a low-income, high-poverty school shook me to the bones and it did so because it shattered my belief that everyone in America had equal opportunities.  I saw middle school students that had already given up on school because they knew they would just be dropping out in a couple years anyway.  Thirteen-year-old kids with no hope and no future is not something I had ever experienced growing up.  And yet, they were perfectly justified in their worldview.  The system was stacked against them from day one.  This idea of an unequal playing field would play a huge role in my eventual decision to leave the profession.

Becoming A Master of Education - Earning my master's degree was something I had always wanted to do.  So, after two years of classroom experience, I went running back to my parents begging them for money to pay for two additional years of education.  They happily (begrudgingly?) obliged.  And so, at the ripe old age of 24, I was again in the classroom, this time as a student.  The highlights of my master's program were the friendships I made as well as the opportunity to spend three weeks in Kenya in the summer of 2010.  The downside of my program was that I didn't receive the kind of education I wanted to.  Sure, my GPA was stellar, and I felt I mastered the classroom material, but overall the program wasn't structured in a way where I could immediately put the information to use to help me improve my daily teaching.  For me, my master's program ended up being a drawer full of handouts, reference sheets, and textbooks and not much else.  I was appreciative of the extra money the degree afforded my in my teaching paycheck, buy overall I don't feel the program helped me grow as an educator the way in which I would have liked to.


The Charter School Alternative - Leave it to me to quit my job during the worst economic recession in nearly eighty years.  And yet, that's exactly what I did when I moved out to California in the summer of 2009.  With California having no money to hire new teachers the only places where I could even be considered were charter schools.  Charter schools sell themselves as an alternative to traditional public schools.  They have more resources, better technology, and smaller class sizes which undoubtedly aid student learning.  The downside?  The staff at charter schools are worked to death.  The expectations placed upon them are beyond ridiculous.  The school administration cuts corners to ensure that the schools stay open and continue to receive public funds.  That combination of being overworked and under-appreciated all while watching as kids are essentially being taken advantage of became unbearable for me and so after five years at three separate charter schools, I had no choice but to call it quits.

Love And Marriage - Toward the end of my 20s, I was able to score roughly a dozen invites to various weddings throughout the country for a variety of friends and family.  These weddings took me to such places as New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Maryland, North Carolina, Colorado, and California and there were also a couple of bachelor parties thrown in which took me to Florida and, of course, Las Vegas.  I'm not ashamed to admit that weddings may be one of my favorite things to experience.  Seeing people you've come to know and love become united with someone else is definitely a beautiful experience and the fact that people from all over come together to celebrate the happy couple's love just makes it that much more rewarding.  I enjoy not only being able to reflect on the time I spent growing up with my friends, but I also relish the opportunity to meet people from their lives that, like me, were fortunate enough to have crossed paths with a member of the happy couple.

Friends And Family - Throughout my 20s, the consummate theme for me was that of friends and family.  I can say that, especially tonight after receiving a phone call from my parents at work, being taken to dinner by my grandparents and uncle and then receiving 50+ Facebook posts all regarding my 30th birthday.  It is through my upbringing, my schooling, and my jobs that I have met a variety of crazy, unorthodox, kooky, loving people that have touched my life in so many positive ways.  Throughout my wandering journey, they have always been there for me and I'm so grateful to have such a solid support system in place.  Technology has made this easier, but I fully credit my friends and family who have reached out to me and supported me throughout my journey through this crazy thing called life.  It is because of them that I have survived as long as I have and that I feel as fulfilled as I do.

Three decades down.  Seven more to go.

The journey continues.

'Tis the Season: Adding New Staff for the New Year

As we approach the winter holiday season, there's a lot going on at the office.

First things first.  I know all my loyal readers (all six of you) are dying to know how my calling is going.  Well, the truth is I am, in fact, calling better.  I've have been up for three of the past four weeks with last week being my best week in over two months.  As I mentioned in my last blog post, I felt I wasn't that far off and this assessment ended up being spot on.  With a couple of minor tweaks, I finally found my stride and now am a good (but not great) caller.

The key I found was to be engaging on the phone.  This isn't easy to do but for me I've found I'm most effective the less robotic I sound.  Therefore, I make a conscientious effort to engage the members on the phone and I try my best to tell a good story with the script I have to read.  The second part is to listen, nay listen to the members.  This is definitely something that comes with time.  You have a large number of people to talk to and yet at the same time, you have to be actively listening to the members and hearing what they have to say.  If you listen close enough, they can give you clues about themselves and you can use these clues to relate to them over the phone.

These past few weeks, I've had some genuinely positive calls where I have talked with members about various things.  Through this experience, I've learned that as much as doing this kind of calling can be frustrating, it can also lead you to some memorable experiences.  I talked to a woman in Pennsylvania who had been an environmental activist for nearly 50 years.  I talked to a woman in Iowa who mentioned an interesting National Geographic documentary on icebergs.  I talked to a man in Minnesota who gave a door donation because it was a pretty college student asking for money.  All of these people had stories to tell, it was up to me to listen to them.  And because I listened, all three contributed financially to the cause.

And so with the calling issue behind me, I've been focused on our office's next major push:  Recruitment.  The challenge with running a call center is that there is near constant turn over.  People leave for a variety of reasons:  School, better job opportunities, family issues, or they are asked to leave due to low performance.  I've been at my job for three months now and there are only eight callers still in the office that were there at the start of my tenure.  Currently, we have twelve callers where we need closer to seventeen to hit our target goals.  Therefore, we have been busy recruiting new members these past two weeks.

The recruitment process is fairly simple.  We post ads on Craigslist and then the floodgates open.  Literally.  Last week we posted our first ad and within five minutes we had our first job call.  At the end of the week we had nearly 100 applicants for the available positions.  Once we receive a job call or an online application, we then talk to the person on the phone.  We ask him or her some basic questions to see if they'd be a good fit to come in for an interview.  If they are, we invite them either in the morning or in the afternoon for the interview.

The first interview is in two parts:  The first part is simply an overview of the organization and the job itself.  After that is one-on-one interviews conducted by a director.  Last week I ended up conducting roughly fifteen of these.  These are short 5-8 minute interviews where the candidate gets an opportunity to discuss himself or herself and reads a short script to test their reading ability.  If a candidate excels he or she is invited back.  If not, the candidate is thanked for their time and wished the best in their job search.

At this point, I've come to recognize what makes a good candidate.  In addition to sounding good with a script read I also look for someone who is willing to learn and also is passionate about the opportunity that is presented.  This kind of work simply can't be a job.  In order to excel, you need to be engaged with what you're doing.  It's not simply selling credit cards or auto loans:  It's selling people an idea where the result is a movement for positive social change.  The best candidates discuss how they are attracted for this kind of work because they can use it to educate others and to make a positive difference in the world.

That is the kind of person we initially look for.  However, even those particular traits do not ensure success at the job.  Which is why we also have a training week where the candidates are calling on the floor.  They have support, but also are given a large chunk of time to go out there and do the same kind of membership calling the rest of us are doing.  Inevitably, some of the most passionate candidates simply can't handle the rigor of the job and unfortunately are let go.  It's one thing to want to be successful and enact positive social change, it's another thing entirely to flat out be told no, that this particular person wants nothing to do with your movement.

And so, as we head toward the Thanksgiving holiday, we are looking to add a handful of new staff.  In the revolving door that is our office, some will join our full-time staff while other veterans may suddenly leave us.  It's the way of the world for the life of political activists.  There are those that are on your side but inevitably some leave for one reason or another.  If any of history's great activists such as Gandhi, MLK, or Chavez have taught us, it's simply about getting a volume of people involved so that if some flounder, more are on the way so the movement doesn't die.

That's why we are always recruiting in our office.  To keep the movement alive.

Good Call, Bad Call: The Ups and Downs of Telephone Outreach

It's official.  I have hit my first rough patch at my new job.  

As I described last time, a large portion (roughly 40%) of my job is, in fact, getting out onto the floor with the callers and calling our members.  This is important for two main reasons:  First off, to show that we directors aren't simply phantom figures that sit in our office for eight hours a day while our callers slave away at their stations.  Second, it's important for the directors to serve as role models for our callers to show them what good calling both looks and sounds like.  It is the ongoing expectation that the directors are the best callers in the office.  

This expectation is definitely fair.  As directors, we do a lot of staff management and that staff management often times relates to the performance of our callers.  We have to not only analyze performance but be able to listen in carefully to our callers to match up specific skills needed to increase performance.  In our office we have people making minimum wage all the way up to callers who are maxed out in terms of salary and, of course, we have the vast majority of people somewhere in between.  Our goal as directors is to work with all of our callers both individually as well as in small group settings to maximize their potential and it's important that we ourselves have the acquired skills and knowledge to then pass on to our callers to help them succeed.  

However, that is a lot easier said than done.  

This past week, I officially passed 100 calling hours.  According to Malcolm Gladwell, I only have 9,900 more hours before I am officially an expert.  Unfortunately, the organization I currently work for hasn't given me a two-hundred week window so instead they are looking for me to be a consistent caller at this point.  Things started out well and I had a good stretch of three straight weeks in September where I was one of the top callers in the office.  Unfortunately, I am not in the midst of having a three-week stretch where I have been one of the poorer callers in the office and this bad stretch just happened to culminate with the national director's on-site visit to our office last week.  

Timing never has been my thing.  

Fortunately both the national director and my fellow directing team has been supportive of me.  My fellow directors have given me positive feedback including helping me re-adjust my mindset when it came to calling.  My issue up through last week was the fact that I am extremely hard on myself and I expect myself to succeed in what I do as long as I put in enough time and effort.  I am used to life endeavors where I can see noticeable progress as long as work is put in whether it's something like running, or lifting weights, or in my teaching performance by looking at classroom averages on tests.  However, when it came to calling I found that there was no real rhyme or reason as to why I was up for three weeks and then down for three weeks.  I felt like an all-star baseball player, marred in an 0 for 25 slump.  

However, unlike baseball there is no film to analyze.  

Which is what makes calling such a challenging endeavor.  A large part of it is mental and you literally have to have the "memory of a goldfish" as my fellow director so aptly described.  You can be told off during one call and then two seconds later you have to greet a new person with a happy, cheerful tone.  Sometimes, you can do everything right and the member still won't be able to contribute financially to the campaign.  Sometimes a member will go off on you for no apparent reason.  Sometimes a member will want to become involved but won't be able to due to various life circumstances.  All this, and yet as a caller you have to do everything in your power to forget the past minute and do it all over again.  

For four hours at a time.  

At of late last week, I personally felt like I was beginning to call better even though my numbers didn't indicate it.  In addition to regular member calling we have also been doing some GOTV calling on a ballot measure in Oregon to label GMOs.  This kind of calling involves us actually engaging in members and trying to persuade them to vote for the measure.  For me, this has been a good opportunity to sit back and think about the purpose of calling.  That purpose is essentially to tell a good story and to convince people to get involved in what you are working on.  For the ballot measure in Oregon, the purpose is to convince people that GMOs should be labeled and that they should actively work to ensure that this measure passes.  This is the first time I've had a chance to do this kind of calling and it has helped me shift my perspective on calling to that of being a good, engaging and persuasive caller with a higher objective in mind.  

In addition, I've also begun to think about my strengths as a caller and to try and utilize those.  As a native New Englander, I know that I talk fast and so I made it a habit to slow down when I first started calling.  However, when I was struggling the past couple weeks I noticed that often times I wasn't even getting through my script and that somehow I had become less engaging over the phone.  This past week, I sped up my script read and found that I had opportunities to get through much more of the script and to engage people longer about the issues.  I began to realize that I will never sound "sweet" or "kind" as some of our female callers can do so well but what I can do it to be an engaging caller on the phone.  I can talk passionately about the issues, which is why I got into this line of work in the first place.  I feel that if I can utilize this passion going forward then I have the chance to be a much more engaging voice to talk with over the phone.  

Only time will tell if I have, in fact, turned a corner in my calling.  I feel like I am close, but again, calling is such an imperfect art form that there is no way to tell for sure.  All I know is that I am tired of not performing at the level I am capable of and the level I need to be at to properly do my job.  Right now, I feel like an English teacher who constantly writes grammatical errors on the board and his students begin to wonder if he even knows what he's doing.  I don't like that feeling.  I want my fellow directors and the national director to see me perform at the level I am capable of.  In short, I want to be recognized for being good at all aspects of my job.

All I need to do is just go out there and do it.  

Who Are You: Self-Identifying Myself in My New Profession

"So, what do you do?"

Two weekends ago, I returned to my old stomping ground for my good friend Joe's wedding in Newport, Rhode Island.  In addition to being a great chance to reunite with my high school friends (who may or may not spill wine on themselves less than halfway through the evening) it also served as an opportunity for me to describe my new profession to both friends and strangers alike.  So, naturally when people asked me the aforementioned question as to what I do, I had a response handy and ready to go.

(blank stare)

Now, that's not to say I was trying to be rude.  However, it dawned upon me that I had yet to truly define how I identify myself in my new line of work.  When I taught for seven years, I was a teacher and there was never any question about how I describe my line of work.  Initially, during my senior year of college, we had a guest speaker who insisted that we were "educators" rather than teachers but I personally thought that idea was dumb so I made a conscientious effort to always refer to myself as a teacher.  Yet with my new job, I have come to realize that I don't have a good answer as to how I refer to my new chosen profession.

To understand my situation, I feel I should explain the daily ins and outs of my job to provide context for exactly what it is I do.  Starting off, my official job title is an assistant director.  Essentially that is what I do.  However, both the daily job tasks as well as the field itself merit further discussion and it is because of this that I am hesitant to simply refer to myself as an assistant director for a non-profit.

The organization I work for is, in fact, a nation-wide progressive non-profit organization.  It's part of a federation of non-profits that work on both environmental as well as public interest issues.  The environmental part is fairly self-explanatory:  These organization work on a variety of environmental issues like conservation, alternative energy, and banning unsafe practices among others.  The public interest part is a little more involved, but what it comes down to is acting on the part of consumers whose own public interests are being drowned out on the national stage, usually by big money and unresponsive politicians elected to represent them.  The public interest groups we work with work on such issues as public health, public safety, and closing tax loopholes among other things.

That's the broader picture of the organization I work for.  To be more specific, I work for one of three national call centers that work on behalf of these organization.  The way I describe it is that these organizations have outsourced their work to us so they can use their time and resources to canvass new members, do research, do public awareness events, and hold press conferences alerting the media to their work.  Each office has certain regions or "turf" as it is called that they are in charge of managing.  Out of our California office, we are in charge of California groups, but we also call members in New Jersey, Maryland, Connecticut, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Texas, Georgia, and Iowa.  In addition to these states, we will also call for some nationwide groups that reach out to members in nearly all fifty states.

The kind of calling we do also varies, depending on our clients' needs.  For the most part, we deal with memberships.  We renew members, try to convince older members to become involved again, and touch base with people who have been canvassed and encourage them to become members as well.  In addition to this, we will also call for some of the national groups and will try to solicit brand new members who are members of similar environmental or consumer advocacy groups.  Besides membership calling, we will also use voting registration information to gather signatures for various petitions that our partner groups may be working on.  Lastly, in a close election we may use our limited political sway to make calls to our members encouraging them to support a specific candidate whose views align closely to those of one of our member organizations.

So, as you can see there is definitely a large telemarketing aspect to my job.  Especially since I am on the phones with other callers on a near daily basis.  However, it's not truly telemarketing as we're not simply selling a product or even a membership as it is.  The goal of our calling it to build support for our organizations and to help them win campaigns.  All the groups we call for are non-profits and do not have the power or financial resources to lobby on Capitol Hill.  Their strength comes from the  support from their members.  Our goal is to get as many people as possible involved in the campaigns and talking about these issues so that when it becomes time for a state or local legislature to vote on these issues, our members will have enough political clout to help convince their elected representative to vote on their behalf.

However, the calling is only a small part of what I do on a daily basis.

As a director, I am expected to call.  However, there also is a lot of addition work that goes along with the "director" portion of my official job title.  I'm involved in hiring and firing employees as well as conducting pay evaluations for current employees as well.  I conduct group overviews and do in-person interviews with perspective employees and I help train and monitor recently hired staff.  Each day, I start up the calling software, I produce reports analyzing how our callers are calling, and I help manage which groups we call for using that same software.  In addition, there are also random tasks around the office that I assist with including payroll, printing pledge cards and reminders, sealing and stamping envelopes, assisting with supervisor notes, and setting up the room before the callers arrive.

In other words, there's a lot going on.

And yet, I still don't have a good answer for what I do.  I feel that that even saying that "I'm an assistant director for a non-profit" doesn't do the job justice.  However, at the same time I don't think I can identify as being a "political activist" although that's what I feel like on a near daily basis.  I also think that by saying "I work for a political non-profit" is too vague.  So, I'm essentially left with the same conundrum that I was faced with two weeks ago in that I still don't have a simple answer for what I do.  However, at least now I have had enough reflection time to come up with a much better response than a simple blank stare.

"What do I do?  The better question is what don't I do!"  

No Money Mo Problems: Adjusting to Life on a Non-Profit Budget

Teachers don't get paid a lot of money.  

I know that comes as a shock to most of you but it's the honest truth.  American society doesn't value its teachers as much as it should, and because of that they aren't financially rewarded as they should be.  Yet, the salary isn't so terrible that teachers are forced to eat raman noodles six days a week.  For the most part, if you manage your budget you can not only survive on a teaching salary but you can also put some money away for retirement.  I was fortunate that over seven years I was able to do this.  Of course the master's degree helped increase the salary and I was also fortunate to have a top-notch financial adviser.  All and all, I felt that the teaching profession offered me a good enough salary that I never felt pressured to take a second job.  I ended up working the past three summers not out of financial necessity but rather to alleviate the boredom that takes hold of me if I'm out of work for too long. 

With my new job, I'm making roughly half of what I was making while teaching.  

Now comes the hard choices.  

I knew full well coming into this line of work that it was nowhere near as lucrative as teaching.  In fact, I joked that I took the job because I was too overpaid and had too much vacation time as a teacher.  What makes that funny now is not only the new salary but the fact that I now have ten days off.  Total.  Although I am in a management position, it is my first-year with the organization so although I have a decent amount of responsibility, my pay reflects that of an entry-level employee.  I knew this coming in and it's just like any professional where you start at the bottom and have to work your way up.  However, unlike a new employee that is just starting and doesn't know what it's like to actually have money, I'm going to have to start making some choices based on my new financial situation.  

Fortunately, I had a decent amount of money saved for this upcoming transition.  I knew that moving would cost a pretty penny and it definitely has.  In addition to the moving cost, I've also had to buy basic furniture (like the couch pictured above) and household necessities, a cable/internet package, a security deposit for my apartment, buy plane tickets and a rent-a-car for my friend's wedding in September and a used bike bought on craigslist as my old one was "beyond repair" as the local bike repair shop so graciously told me.  Now that the big stuff is out of the way I'm going to now figure out just how to adjust my budget to become half of what it had been.  

For the most part, this hasn't been too terrifying.  I've been able to adapt based on my new lifestyle.  For example, because I work long hours I really don't have a consistent time to go to the gym.  Solution?  I currently use the apartment complex gym in the morning before work.  It's nothing too spectacular but it gets the job done and that combined with my bike should keep me in good shape throughout the week.  I've also adjusted my food budget as well.  I used to go food shopping every week on Sunday and would buy food for the week.  Now, I buy whatever is on sale and keep it in my fridge until I eat it.  Since I get home so late, I make sure to have a few food options to just toss in the microwave and eat at 10 P.M.  Fortunately, I've found a Trader Joe's with good deals so that helps keep my food budget low.  

What will take some adjustment will be my work with my financial planner.  While teaching, I was fortunate that not only could I make monthly contributions to my account but I could also contribute larger amounts every couple of months as well.  This helped me max fund my IRA account and also contribute to my portfolio.  However, now with a depleted monthly salary, these contributions are going to have to either be reduced or lumped together at the end of the year.  This isn't going to cripple me financially by any means, but it will slow the growth in my portfolio which had been growing steadily for the last seven years.  Of course, there's always the chance the salary increases after a couple years but as of now I realize that these next two years won't see the kind of portfolio growth I had been accustomed to the previous seven years.  

In addition, I'm also going to have to be careful when it comes to travel.  I will hopefully have some money budgeted in case some of my friends decide to get married within the next year, but it won't be as easy as it had been while teaching.  I just don't think I'll be able to do three or four weddings in a single year due to both my finances as well as my lack of vacation time.  I already had to bail on a good friend next month, whose wedding just happened to be on the same day as the wedding I'm attending.  Fortunately, I don't think I have any weddings in the next six months, but I've learned they tend to come in waves.  If that ends up happening, it seems unfortunate but I realize that I will have to pick and choose which wedding to attend and which weddings I simply can't afford to go to.  

Lastly, I can't help but note that this salary adjustment has given me even more of a reason to do what I'm doing.  All of the above are adjustments I'm making as a single White man.  I will get by, barely, but I'll get by.  I honestly am amazed that families get by on the kind of salary I'm receiving.  It boggles my mind that people are against raising the minimum wage because there is so much that can be done with an extra two or three dollars an hour.  The kind of campaigns my office is working on is helping to address that very problem and I can see how difficult life can be for families making the kind of salary I am.  Instead of worrying about making plans to their financial planner, these families are worrying about paying the bills and providing food for their children.  It's extremely humbling to think about the kind of hard choices these families make each and every day; choices that are so much more difficult than "well I guess I won't pay for a monthly gym membership."  

For that alone, I am thankful I'm in the position I'm in, regardless of the lowered salary I'm now receiving.

525,600 Minutes: Measuring a Year in the Life

One year ago.  

One year ago today I was sitting at my home in San Diego.  I was on my couch, with Microsoft Word open showing my course outlines as well as my lesson planning guide.  I was double checking my materials, making sure to have an extra activity or two for the first day just in case the day's lesson ran short.  After all, as a teacher you can always add lessons and the students will never know it wasn't part of the original plan.  The last thing you as a teacher ever want to do is have any kind of down time, especially on the first day.

My night before the first day of school this year is quite different.  

In fact, it's nothing at all like like year, nor is it like the previous six years before that.  For the first time in my professional life, I am not feverishly looking over lesson plans, organizing class materials, and looking back to my course outlines.  For the first time, I won't toss and turn the night before school.  For the first time, I won't wake up early, eat my Cheerios and banana, drink my orange juice and arrive to school a good hour before the first students enter my classroom.  And, for the first time, I won't begin a new school year by saying "Good morning, my name is Mister LaFauci..."  

My night this year involves me sitting on a futon, staying with a person I had not met until ten days ago.  It involves me recovering from a day where I woke up, did not eat breakfast, and grabbed a leopard-print umbrella that did not belong to me while heading out into a rainy Boston morning.  It also involved me having taken the orange line of the T, having attended a training for ten hours, having taken the T back, having grabbed some Chinese food alone, and having returned to the place where I was staying after spending thirteen hours out and about in Massachusetts' largest city.  

So as I sit here, I ask myself this:  How do you measure a year in the life?  

As I sit here reflecting on this question, it's interesting to me the twists and turns that a person experiences in his or her life.  Right now, my Facebook feed is filled with posts and updates of friends at previous schools I worked at.  One friend in Winston-Salem is celebrating her birthday and is beginning a new school year as a librarian rather than a classroom teacher.  One friend from San Diego just competed in a triathlon in Chicago.  One friend from San Diego is beginning her career as an assistant principal.  And my friends and colleagues at my previous school in Spring Valley are exactly where I was one year ago:  Looking over lesson plans, organizing class materials, and looking back to their class outlines.  

Life takes us all in many unexpected directions.  For myself, I could never have imagined that within a year I would have changed careers entirely.  I could not have imagined that I would have packed up my things and moved to Sacramento to work for a non-profit.  I could not have imagined that I would have attended a training in Boston where I would be learning the skills needed to become an activist and organizer.  I could not have imagined that I would be out canvassing in the city of Boston one day and then being in a room where we Skype with a former campaign organizer for Barack Obama the next day.  

In short, I had no idea that I would end up where I am today.

And yet, I am here and I am happy.  Not many people I know enjoy sitting in a room talking and discussing politics.  However, here in Boston these past ten days, that has been all we have been doing.  Not many people I know would look enjoy canvassing outside a Wholefoods.  However, that is what I did and I found the experience invigorating.  Not many people I know would enjoy being twenty-nine years old and having to memorize a page-long rap to recite to their peers the following day.  However, that is what I did and I made it my mission to excel at this activity.  

Going forward, I don't know where I will be one year from now.  All I know is that I won't be back in Boston, as this training is for newbies only.  What I know is that I will have another opportunity to reflect upon my adventures.  I know that many of my friends will being getting ready for the first day of school while others may very well be like myself and have decided to take a different career path.  Regardless of where I am next year, I know that I will have stories to tell about where I am and what I hope to continue to accomplish.  

Though the story never ends.  

New Beginnings: A Career Born in the Shadow of a Revolution

I've always been a sucker for symbolism.

We as human beings always try to find a larger meaning in simple acts.  It's part of our experience to believe that somehow, some way the universe is sending us symbols to help guide us in the right direction.  We don't like to acknowledge the fact that everything we do is purely by chance.  That goes against such time-honored romantic ideas of fate, destiny, and kismet.  Because if we aren't destined to do great things then why should we be motivated?  If for whatever reason, we aren't part of the universe's pre-determined plan, then why should we even bother?

This past week, I spent five days in Boston, Massachusetts for the first week of my new job training.  The training was held in the financial district of Boston, an area rich in both history as well as modernity.  As I walked off the nearly century-old subway system, I would pass by modern skyscrapers to the left and a meetinghouse used by patriots during the American Revolution on the right.  Each day as I headed to the fifth floor of the office building I wondered if the fact that I was walking the same route that men like Paul Revere, John Adams, and John Hancock meant anything in the larger scheme of things.

In a word:  Yes.

As someone who doesn't consider himself religious, it should be odd that I buy into things like symbolism.  It doesn't make sense.  I know that the universe is not particularly interested in my success or well-being.  I could live to be one hundred years old or I could pass away tomorrow.  In the grand scheme of things, I am merely a series of molecules formed together in one of seven billion homo sapiens on this planet.  I don't believe in any form of destiny whether it relates to being destined for greatness, finding your one true soul mate, or any major life event having been due to fate.  I believe that each and every one of us is here on a whim, and what we do with our lives, who we find, and where we end up are all products of chance.

And yet, there is something that is just so darn appealing about symbolism.

This past week as I began my new career, I was unsure of myself and what I had decided to do.  Believe it or not, it's not highly recommended to leave your chosen career after four years of undergraduate study, two years of graduate study, and seven years in the field.  It's also not recommended to then move up your belongings into a pod, move five hundred miles north and live in a brand new city.  And most of all, it's not recommended to give up a job with good benefits and a state retirement plan to start at a brand new job for half the salary, no benefits to start, and no health plan.

So I needed something to let me know I was making the right decision.  Something to reaffirm what for me was a difficult and life-altering decision.  The truth of the matter is, my training could have very well been in a variety of cities across the country, but it just so happened to be in Boston.  The training could have been located anywhere in the city, but it just happened to be in an historic area of the city right off of the Freedom Trail that highlighted important events in our country's founding.  The job could have been dealing with a variety of issues but it just so happened to be a job to help build a movement for progressive change in this country.  For someone such as myself looking for something to reaffirm my decision, this symbolic location seemed to be just what I needed.

And so, over the course of the past week I've learned about my new job.  I've learned about entering a field where I am with like-minded people fighting on behalf of the good of the people.  Discussing political issues over drinks and on the metro.  Being with people who read the newspaper online and while waiting in line at Starbucks.  Realizing that there are a variety of simple solutions to our world's problems that aren't being put into action for a number of reasons.  Planning for the upcoming year and putting the greater good of the people about our individual wants and needs.  Getting angry and scared and frustrated about where our country is and having each and every one of us caring passionately about leaving the world a better place.

I won't pretend that the minds that met on the fifth floor of that building in any way rivaled Revere, Adams, and Hancock.  However, knowing that I sat and discussed important political issues of the day on the same street as these men was in a word, inspiring.  Knowing that I now have the ability to make a difference like these early patriots is something that left a strong impression on me.  I'm only one week into this new career and yet I realized that I have found a place where my passions and my career have a chance to merge into one.  All of a sudden I'm not viewed as "odd" because I watch Real Time with Bill Maher and blog on a Friday night.  I can have discussions where my political views are apparent among my co-workers and for the first time in my career, I won't have to worry about repercussions about having these views.  Knowing these things helps give me hope that maybe, when all is said and done, I may have made the right decision after all.

All thanks to a few old buildings that just happened to be on the same street as my job training.

Boxed In: Thoughts on Packing and Owning "Stuff"

"That's the whole meaning of life.  Trying to find a place for your stuff."  

I've been thinking a lot about this quote the last couple of days.  George Carlin was truly a comedic genius and I regret that I have only come across his work in the past couple of years.  What makes Carlin an absolute legend is how astute he was in human nature.  The above quote is part of a five-minute long sketch where he talks about how our entire lives as human beings revolve around the concept of "stuff."  We have houses to hold our "stuff" while we go out and buy more "stuff."  When we have too much "stuff" we then need another, even bigger home.  We stay with friends and are confused by the "stuff" they own.  When we go on vacation, we immediately unpack our "stuff."  When we visit friends on vacation, it becomes even more difficult to pick which kind of "stuff" we take with us.  

These past three days I've been organizing and storing all my "stuff" into a 7' x 7' x 8' container pictured above.  I have been in my current place for three years, in San Diego for five years, and "on my own" post-college for seven years.  So, clearly as George Carlin would have you believe, I must be in possession of way too much "stuff," right?  

Actually, no.  

In fact, the above picture represents pretty much everything I own with the exception of a few smaller bags, and items that are placed in my car as well as a bike and bike rack attached to the trunk.  On the whole, I don't own a lot of "stuff".  A quick inventory:  1 car, 2 dressers, 4 bookshelves, 1 CD/DVD bookshelf, 1 DVD rack, 1 queen-sized mattress and box-spring, 1 fan, 1 humidifier, 2 lamps, books, clothes, 6 pillows, 5 posters, 3 boxes of school supplies/textbooks, 1 egg crate mattress, random gadgets and knickknacks and a metaphorical partridge in a pear tree.  

That's it.  

And you know what?  I'm okay with not owning a lot of stuff.  

I feel that the whole idea of owning "stuff" is a socially constructed way of measuring worth in today's society.  The problem is that we as a society value "stuff" way more than we should.  We see the person with the fancy cars and nice house and we automatically assume this person is successful, which most likely he or she is.  However, we don't question how this person got his or her money.  Was he or she a successful entrepreneur?  Did he or she inherit the money?  Is he or she a hedge fund manager?  Is he or she a drug dealer?  Is he or she an entertainer?  All we see as a society is someone rich and powerful, regardless of how they got there.  

In the movie American Beauty, the character played by Kevin Spacey has a revelation.  It occurs as he is trying to seduce his wife on an expensive leather sofa and is coming dangerously close to spilling wine on it.  When this happens, Spacey's wife warns him of this impending accident and Spacey himself flips out by screaming "It's just a couch!"  He then goes on to lecture his wife about how all their possessions have become more important to her than actually living a full life.  It is at this point in the film that Spacey realizes his marriage is beyond saving because his wife's "stuff" was more important to her than he'd ever be. 

I guess a lot of it depends on how you were raised.  For me, I was fortunate in that I was never surrounded by unnecessary "stuff."  Everything in my home had a purpose.  My friends' homes were the same way.  I guess this is what happens when you grow up in middle-class suburbia:  You don't yearn for things that you aren't exposed to.  I vividly recall an instance when I was twelve-years-old and my Dad and I dropped of a baseball teammate to his home.  As we pulled up I commented that it was a "small house."  Once my friend was dropped off, my father stopped the car and gave me a lecture as to why that was a disrespectful thing to say and why I shouldn't say thing like that again.  

Lesson learned.  

And yet, for many people the idea of having stuff is what drives them to make some ridiculous choices throughout life.  The lawyers on Wall Street aren't working 100 hour weeks because they love the law, they're working because they want to own "stuff."  People in line on Black Friday or during the new iPhone release days are literally knocking each other over to be the first ones to buy the "stuff" even though it will still be there at a future date.  Collectors will forgo their life savings to buy that one piece of memorabilia that completes their collection of other massively expensive "stuff."  Couples will get in fights and arguments over whether or not their newest "stuff" should be the convertible for Mom or Dad or the family-friendly minivan for them and the kids.  

For myself, owning "stuff" has never been a problem, but I've seen firsthand the destructive effect it can have on people close to me . I've had friends who have gotten into massive debt because they needed to own the latest "stuff" to add to their apartments.  At a time when they should have been saving money and investing it, all they saw were the newest plasma TVs, laptop computers, and gaming systems.  Unfortunately for them, their credit card became a blank check for which they would plop down large sums of money with no reasonable expectation to pay it back any time soon.  As more and more creditors began calling, these friends finally wised up and realized that their quest for "stuff" might not be the healthiest thing for them and their future credit score.  

As a Wandering Millennial, part of what makes this lifestyle possible is the fact that I don't own a lot of "stuff."  I haven't needed it.  I've always been perfectly content with the bare essentials.  I don't watch cable or play video games, so why would I need a 50" plasma TV?  I use my car to get from point A to point B so why would I need an Aston Martin?  I use my laptop computer for word processing, e-mail, and to store my music and pictures so why would I need a $5,000 top-of-the-line machine?  For me, all these items are superfluous.  In fact, with my current upcoming move, it will be the first time in my adult life that part of my essential "stuff" has included things like a couch and a dining room set.  Up until this point, I've never needed them.  

I guess that is what separates me from those who need "stuff."  I don't view "stuff" as a status symbol.  I'm highly skeptical of people who start conversations by asking how much money I make.  It doesn't matter how much I make or how many cars I own.  What matters is I'm a person with thoughts, feelings, ideas, hopes and dreams.  I realize that people like that represent a small segment of the population that I will never interact with.  I'm okay with that.  I'm okay with having a seven-year-old car with dents on the front bumper and rear taillight.  I'm okay with the fact that right now, I honestly couldn't tell you what the most expensive thing I own is, besides my car.  I'm okay with the fact that my laptop computer is five years old and the fact that my iPod is so outdated that it's a struggle to find a sleeve that actually fits it.   And, I'm perfectly okay with having everything I own fit nicely in a 7' x 7' x 8' storage pod with a decent amount of room to spare.

At least until I add a couch and a dining room set.    

A Bold and Dashing Adventure is in Your Future

"Now where did that come from?"

Of course nobody responded.  That tends to happen when you are talking to an empty room.

But still, where did that come from?  A small fortune somehow found its way under the sheets I had been sleeping in the previous four nights while staying with my grandparents.  I hadn't had a fortune cookie since I'd been there.  In fact, I hadn't had a fortune cookie in nearly three weeks and I most certainly didn't keep the fortune when I did.  Yet, somehow as I was walking out the door this morning to begin my eight-hour drive home, there it was.

Urging me on my latest dashing adventure.

Once upon a time, there was a romanticism associated with perpetual movement.  In the Old West, people left their homes in search of adventures on the frontier.  After World War I, a group of disenchanted ex-pats packed up shop and headed to Europe and wrote some of the greatest literature America had ever read.  In the 1960s, it was perfectly acceptable to hop in a VW bus with a group of tie-dyed strangers and make your way to San Francisco, as long as you were wearing some flowers in your hair.  The history books speak openly and positively of those with a restless spirit who yearned for a sense of adventure.

I am not one of those people.

Granted, my story does have some of those elements.  I am, a wander as they say.  Hence the title of this blog.  However, I don't see a sense of romanticism of what I am doing.  I don't yearn for the open road.  I was on the open road today for nine hours and it was way too damn hot.  I hate packing and relocating.  The picture above represents a half hour of work tonight and here I am blogging as to avoid moving any other heavy objects for the duration of the night.  I don't like unpredictability.  Right now I have a schedule of meals I eat each and every week so I know what I'm eating at what time and on what day.  I'm always early when I go places and I hate having to rely on other people.

So then why am I moving 500 miles north for my fifth job in eight years?

Good question, dearest reader.  Here is probably the most convincing argument as to why what I'm doing in not romantic in the slightest way.

I have no clue what I want to do with my life.

It's the simple truth.  I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up.  I'm turning 30 in just over 4 months.  Sure, I had a college degree and a career.  I was a secondary social studies education major and a teacher.  I taught on both coasts.  I taught middle and high school.  I taught U.S. history, world history, government and economics, 7th grade English, 7th grade social studies, health and P.E., an advisory class, and even a contemporary issues elective class.  I taught at public schools and charter schools.  I coached soccer, debate team, quiz bowl, sang with the concert choir, got dressed up for Halloween, chaperoned prom, and even ran the backstage crew for a school play.  In addition, I emailed parents, collaborated with colleagues, sat in on I.E.P. meetings, planned lessons, graded papers, and reflected on my craft on a daily basis.

In the end, it wasn't enough.

I wasn't good enough.  Or maybe I was just ahead of my time.  I don't know.  Honestly, when I was let go of my last job it was an odd mix of relieved disappointment.  I had been considering a move for a few months to a new field.  However, I never thought the decision would be made for me instead of on my terms.  And yet, the last week of May that's exactly what happened.  My contract wasn't renewed.  At a high school of 2,200 students with 80 full-time staff I was the only teacher on site to be asked not to come back.

A dubious honor to say the least.

And so, I wandered.  Not physically, but rather online.  Let me tell you, it's hard to translate teaching to real world applicable skills.  At what other job could I successfully manage 30 people at a single time, while interacting with over 100 people on a daily basis?  At what other job could I help and nurture developing young men and women both intellectually as well as socially?  At what other job could I help generate interest in elective-level classes, helping to ensure students not only pass my class but attain the skills they would need to become successful in a post-secondary educational setting?

My answer:  No job like this existed.

So, I did the next best thing.  I looked for a career that I would be passionate about.  Throughout all my teaching, I knew I had a passion for politics.  I can't explain it.  It's just always there, like the chorus of your favorite song.  This past year, that passion seemed to come alive.  My favorite websites would be news sites.  During my free time I would be writing about political issues.  My Saturday night Netflix would consist of watching The West Wing.  It would take every ounce of power in my body not to post about current events on Facebook.  Those who did who I disagree with quickly became unfriended.  I even ventured into the seventh layer of hell known as Twitter to set up a fake account to troll politicians.

Because I care about this country's future.

It's why I got into teaching in the first place.  The chance to make a positive difference in the world.  I am no fortunate son in that things have come easy for me.  I've had to work hard to get where I am.  And yet, I know through my experiences that I've had many things go right to help get me where I am.  Hell, I won life's lottery:  I'm a White male.  Jackpot!  And yet, for every benefit that has come my way over the years (playing travel team sports, taking SAT prep classes, affording a top-quality education, traveling abroad, moving across the country) I've come to realize that the vast majority of people in this country will never have access to these opportunities.

And they work as hard, and in many cases, harder than I do.

So, I found work at a non-profit based in Northern California.  It is here where this blog begins and is here where I will chronicle my adventures.  I will be here for at least two years.  It is an entry-level management position.  My official title is assistant director (business cards are being printed as we speak).  I will be working on behalf of progressive groups out there fighting for such noble causes as marriage equality, nature conservation, environmental conservation, health issues and concerns, access to women's health, immigration reform, and a whole slew of others.  In four days, I head to my first training on the East Coast.  This afternoon, I got my first homework assignment.  I'd be lying if I said I wasn't chomping at the bit to start work on it as we speak.

And so begins the adventures of The Wandering Millennial.  I don't anticipate to be the subject of any novel, documentary, or Weird Al song anytime soon.  In fact, I'd be hard-pressed if anyone besides friends and family actually follow this blog.  However, if others join, I'd be honored and I'd love to share my story with you.  One thing that has kept me sane through my wandering years has been my writing.  It still needs some polishing, but the more I do it, the more confident I become.  I'm hoping these next two years will provide me some ample opportunities to share with you my latest wandering adventures.

So stick around, dearest reader.  You won't be disappointed.

Unless, of course, the fortune cookie lied.