Problems are easier to find than solutions
So, it’s time to take stock of the situation a bit. With the divorce finalized, I need to start figuring out where I go from here.
– I am not getting married again. Emphatically not. I told the Professor this long before he moved from California to be with me. He was upset at the time, but now it’s a non-issue. Is that because he is no longer upset by that, or because he thinks I’m going to change my mind? And do I push to get an answer on that? I’ve been honest with him, it isn’t as if I’ve misrepresented my situation.
– I need to figure out how to get my own space without offending the Professor. Either that, or I need to loosen up a bit. He’s sweet, but he definitely has his own ideas about what does and does not need to be done about the apartment. He says he wants to take responsiblity for some of the chores like dishwashing, and gets offended if I step in and take care of them. But I swore to myself that I was not going to let dishes pile up, and it aggravates me when he lets two days go by and doesn’t attend to them. I know he’s going to get to it – eventually. But I resent that he has so much more free time than I do and still puts off jobs like that.
– I have to figure out where I’m going with my veterinary degree. If I’m really thinking about moving so that the Professor can be closer to his family, I’m either going to have to bite the bullet and go into private practice, or I’m going to have to find something other than food safety in industry. There is no way I’m going to find a job like the one I have now anywhere else in the country. And I’ve only got a couple of years before getting licensed to practice out of the state I live in now becomes difficult to impossible. I barely scraped by the boards; I’ll never be able to do the new tests they’ve developed. I’ve been out of school too long. So I have to strike out before my boards are five years old.
– I have got to lose weight. Which means that either the Professor modifies his taste in food, or we start eating separate meals. There is no way I can continue eating the way he does and keep weight off. Theoretically, this should be the easiest thing to get a grip on, but I know in practice I’m going to have a rough time with it.
Why is it always so much easier to locate the problems than the solutions?