On Quitting

I am a terrible quitter. I stay on the path I have chosen until it becomes clear that I am unhappy. The path I had chosen for myself should have revealed itself to be the wrong one long ago -- and yet I miss all the warning signs. This is why I am still in graduate school. I thought I could stick it out -- I thought I really wanted to be Dr. Anna and teach sociology at a liberal arts school. And then I found myself wandering around the streets of Dubrovnik, crying. I didn't know when I had started. I realized I needed a change, and I thought that being a professor of Eastern European history would provide the answer. It didn't. I ignored the small voice inside of me whispering, "Teach middle school. That's where you belong." It had been whispering for years. That voice had been telling me what to do since I took high school students to Morocco. But I thought I had to stay on the path I had chosen.

Sometimes I think maybe I'm trying to be too much like my dad. My dad weighs the pros and cons of any major decision before making it. But when I try to do this, inevitably, that little voice pops up and tells me to do what my dad would think illogical. My friend Jessica once referred to me as a "free spirit." I thought "I can't be a free spirit -- I plan too much." Yet I'm starting to realize that she's right.

My Balkan summer taught me that I am a person who is happiest living passionately. I think I've written about this here before -- I throw myself into life without really thinking about the consequences. Rather than test the waters, I go for a swim. I get excited about everything -- new people, new food, plants, and books. I wear my heart on my sleeve -- or, as the Serbs say "my soul on my face," and I know it. When I am unhappy about something, I feel it deeply. I don't sleep. I have to fix whatever it is that is wrong first. But it's funny -- when trying to fix what is wrong, I never think that it's the path I'm on itself. I always think that I just need to tweak a few things, and everything will be fine. Right?

Well, as I have learned in these heady days full of new passions, new beginnings, and renewal, sometimes I need to be a better quitter. I keep reminding myself that it's okay to stop. It's okay to fail. It's never too late to change your mind. Because my "stick-to-it" nature is in conflict with the part of me that craves new adventures, new places, new people, and what is unknown. To me, the known is familiar and comfortable. The unknown is exciting and beautiful. I am in a period of my life where I am about to step into the unknown. I am following a passion for teaching -- the one that has always been there. The one I had been fighting for years.

By this point, you're probably wondering "so what does this have to do with gardening?" I'm getting there, I promise. A week of sleepless nights and worrying over the P-Patch has made me realize that I have to give up my plot. This may sound selfish, but I don't want to be part of a gardening community. I garden in order to spend time alone with plants -- like how Thoreau went to the woods in order to be alone. The solitude of being in my garden, feeling the good dirt under my hands, watching my plants grow and become food -- that's what I want. Gardening, for me, shouldn't involve meetings and planning. I'd rather it be just me, weeding in my raised bed, singing.

So I gave up my plot today. I apologized to everyone. I admitted that I'd taken on too much. I am walking away because I need gardening to be my alone time. And I need time to spend with the communities I'm already a part of -- grad school, volunteering, neighborhood, and The Mountaineers. I need some time to be a free spirit. And in my garden, the mountains, and in my beautiful city -- with old friends and new friends, or alone, I will do what I have always done during these times of transition.

Once again, I will fall in love with the world.