The first time I was ever in California was for Christmas 2011. Mom and I weren't going to see Kendra so we went to San Diego instead. I loved it. In the summer of 2012, Mom let me go with her on the Weston Noble Alumni Choir tour. We went to San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, and San Diego. I loved it even more. I was already unhappy in Nebraska. I had looked for a different job for the 2012-13 school year, but decided not to take the one I was offered. The benefits didn't outweigh the drawbacks at the time. After the California tour, I started really thinking about living in California. It was so different and that was what I needed. I felt stuck in Nebraska. I was turning 30 and something had to change.
I had jokingly discussed moving to San Francisco with a friend before, but by this point, it wasn't joking anymore. San Francisco wasn't my first choice but if my friend was going to be there too, it was higher on the list. I knew I needed to leave Nebraska and wanted to go somewhere that I was starting over but already had friends. I have friends in Los Angeles. In the 6 hours I had been there before I was shocked at how much I liked it. I never expected to like it. Eventually my friend decided not to move to CA, so Los Angeles was now on the top of my list.
Education in the United States is really struggling. California is not the best place to go be a teacher with budget cuts happening everywhere like crazy. Still, I turned in all my paperwork to get a California teaching credential at the end of October, knowing it was going to take awhile. Oh my goodness. What a pain. I had to send in 3 letters from HR in Bellevue because they weren't specific enough. The last one was basically "Kirsten is a teacher. She has worked here for 4 years. She is employed full time. She has been employed as a full time teacher for all four years." On the last day of school, I woke up for some reason at 3am, checked my email, and saw that my credential had finally been approved. I took that as a sign.
I really struggled with the decision about staying in Bellevue. While I knew something needed to change, it's really hard to voluntarily say that you'll be unemployed. I was also really close to a few people at school and while I think they "knew" that I was going to leave, I still had to tell them myself. Telling another teacher and the SLP was so hard. I wanted them to come with me! When we got the sheet asking if we were returning or not, we had over a week to turn it in. I completely freaked out. I hadn't applied to any jobs. I had no real idea even what city I was going to move to. One worry after another. It was finally a text from a friend that said "Don't sign and don't worry" that almost gave me the mental ok that I could do this.
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