10 Years in Iowa - How'd THAT Happen???
It was 10 years ago today that I loaded up my belongings (well, half of them, anyway), my child, three cats, and a dog into a Ryder rental truck and moved 1,600 miles away. Seattle to Sioux City in four days.
My, how time flies. It’d be fun if we could hop into Peabody’s WayBack Machine for a moment and stop in June, 1995. I’d love to see the reaction on my then 29-year-old face when I told myself, “Hey, guess what, Tommy – in 10 years from now you’ll be divorced from the X, married to the Lovely Mrs. G., and living in Sioux City, Iowa!” I probably would’ve either a) fainted or b) thrown my future self out of my house for being a huge-ass liar.
But as trippy as that may seem, that’s exactly what happened. On Friday morning, October 13, 1995, Miss Katie and I pulled out of the driveway in Seattle and never looked back. 10 years later, here we are. I’m 40 (ugh), Miss Katie is now 18, the Lovely Mrs. G. and I have been hitched for 8 wonderful years, and I own a home in (of all places) Sioux City, Iowa. Gee, imagine that.
As a kid – and even as a 20-something - I never thought I’d live here. The thought of being a Midwestern boy never crossed my mind. But strange things happen. I also never thought that once I got here, I’d actually stay for 10 whole years. Shows what I know.
I’ve always said that Iowa wasn’t my final destination – I’ve always dreamed of living in Florida, and I’ve told people that so far I’m only halfway there. And this may very well be true – it’s our plan to pack it up, sell the house, and move to Sunny FL in the summer of 2007. Probably to the Tampa area somewhere, or maybe Orlando if The Mouse offers me a dream job. (Mrs. G. would prefer the Gulf Coast over the hustle that is Kissimmee, and I can’t say that I blame her, but for an opportunity to have a career with The Mouse, it may be worth it.)
So that’s why I’m busting my butt working full time and going back to college – to make my Florida dream a reality. ‘Cause God knows I don’t want to be celebrating my 20th anniversary of living in Iowa. It’s nice and all, but it sure ain’t warm and sunny 12 months a year.
We’ll have to let this Blog entry serve as my 2005 – 2015 Wayback Machine entry. If the Internet is still standing in 2015 (by then it’ll probably just be a microchip embedded in our brain stem), I’ll come back and look at this prediction, and hopefully find that I was right – a Florida boy is what I’ve become.
But for now, I’ll be glad that I’ve escaped Seattle, and that I’m taking the right steps to escape Sioux City in a mere 21 months from now.
See you then...
My, how time flies. It’d be fun if we could hop into Peabody’s WayBack Machine for a moment and stop in June, 1995. I’d love to see the reaction on my then 29-year-old face when I told myself, “Hey, guess what, Tommy – in 10 years from now you’ll be divorced from the X, married to the Lovely Mrs. G., and living in Sioux City, Iowa!” I probably would’ve either a) fainted or b) thrown my future self out of my house for being a huge-ass liar.
But as trippy as that may seem, that’s exactly what happened. On Friday morning, October 13, 1995, Miss Katie and I pulled out of the driveway in Seattle and never looked back. 10 years later, here we are. I’m 40 (ugh), Miss Katie is now 18, the Lovely Mrs. G. and I have been hitched for 8 wonderful years, and I own a home in (of all places) Sioux City, Iowa. Gee, imagine that.
As a kid – and even as a 20-something - I never thought I’d live here. The thought of being a Midwestern boy never crossed my mind. But strange things happen. I also never thought that once I got here, I’d actually stay for 10 whole years. Shows what I know.
I’ve always said that Iowa wasn’t my final destination – I’ve always dreamed of living in Florida, and I’ve told people that so far I’m only halfway there. And this may very well be true – it’s our plan to pack it up, sell the house, and move to Sunny FL in the summer of 2007. Probably to the Tampa area somewhere, or maybe Orlando if The Mouse offers me a dream job. (Mrs. G. would prefer the Gulf Coast over the hustle that is Kissimmee, and I can’t say that I blame her, but for an opportunity to have a career with The Mouse, it may be worth it.)
So that’s why I’m busting my butt working full time and going back to college – to make my Florida dream a reality. ‘Cause God knows I don’t want to be celebrating my 20th anniversary of living in Iowa. It’s nice and all, but it sure ain’t warm and sunny 12 months a year.
We’ll have to let this Blog entry serve as my 2005 – 2015 Wayback Machine entry. If the Internet is still standing in 2015 (by then it’ll probably just be a microchip embedded in our brain stem), I’ll come back and look at this prediction, and hopefully find that I was right – a Florida boy is what I’ve become.
But for now, I’ll be glad that I’ve escaped Seattle, and that I’m taking the right steps to escape Sioux City in a mere 21 months from now.
See you then...
posted by Tommy G at
11:51 AM
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