**Puffed-Out Cheeks**

And so I sit here, on a Monday morning, dreading the sensory horror that is my office, pondering the coffee that just finished brewing.  I am contemplating the task of drying my hair, tempted to whip up some of my gourmet toast, trying very hard not to scratch the millions of mosquito bites that appeared on my legs sometime over this past weekend.  I am back in my everyday, but I’ve gotten another glimpse of what my everyday will be once I find a job.  Well, at least my weekend everyday.

Last night I returned from visiting IP.  I’ve been hesitant to reveal where he’s currently residing only because I’ve never asked if I could, but I can tell you this – it takes a short flight to get there and it most certainly is not Colorado (three-hour flight there).  I can also tell you that it will be quite an interesting place to live once someone gets off their duff and hires me (or once I get off my resume duff and send in a spectacular letter and list of my past employers).  As I’ve said before, there can be no "if" in this matter – just a "when."  A couple of times over the weekend, IP would hit me with the question, "So when are you going to move here?"  "As soon as I possibly can, but I’m getting a queen bed once I do," I promised with a laugh but with a new sense of determination.  After all, when you’ve finally seen the place you’ll be residing in, the tasks of getting there seem much more manageable and the goal itself much more attainable – in sum, being there makes you want it more, and it can help erase the frustration of not being there already.  I’m not sure if that makes sense, but I was able to get onto a plane Detroit-bound without shedding five million tears and rending my shirt in half.  It’s closer, both the distance between us and the huge life change that I want to make.

I was also extremely happy to be with IP on his birthday.  We’ve been together more than three years, and during the time I’ve known him he’s now had four birthdays of which I have now been present for two.  The first birthday was tinged with sadness on my part – I’d soon be going to do my masters degree at Toronto, and I had no idea what was going to become of us.  Behold, three years later:  Still teasing one another, trying to be in the same place for the first time in two years.  That’s either faith, perseverance or stubbornness – or maybe a wicked combination of those three.  Because I don’t know what else to say that won’t be extremely cheesy and so unlike us, I puff my cheeks out at IP in his general direction.

So, I return to this life, with the determination to make another one come along very soon.  With some wrangling and effort and persistence and the support of my puffed-out-cheeks partner-in-crime, I think I’ll get there soon enough.