Liz Moore - Making It Home: My year as a middle-aged runaway

Making It Home

My year as a middle-aged runaway

By Liz Moore

Copyright 2011 Liz Moore

All rights reserved

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For Rodney and Jane Smith

Table of Contents

AUTHORS NOTE

I have changed the names and otheridentifying details of some of the businesses and individuals thatI encountered on this odyssey. I am deeply grateful to all fortheir support, for kindness shown and lessons taught.

What have I done?

Theres no one in my little Flagstaff motelroom to help me with that question. Thoughts spin chaotically in myown head.

What do I do now?

Besides sweat, and tremble. Check out? Getback in my car and drive a thousand miles home?

My condo in Texas isnt home anymore. Atleast, not for a year. I gave it up to somebody else to be THEIRhome.

MY world is now a 13-year-old Honda Civic.Three weeks ago I stuffed its trunk with clothes, a few pots andpans, a 5-inch TV, a canvas chair, and I drove away. I left onesister, two cats, many friends, a successful career and a verycomfortable lifestyle.

I wanted life Elsewhere, away from roots. Isaid thought I wanted a home, job, new friends, newpastimes in someplace completely different from Kansas and Texas,the two states that evenly divide my first 50 years of both homeand identity.

I dont have a plan or a lot of money. Myidea rests on fate and whim, in a life of total freedom andreinvention, going from town to town. After a month, or two monthsin some small town Ive never seen before, Ill move on to the nextplace. My loop will circle America.

Ive picked Flagstaff to be the first stop,except that yesterday a housing agent dismissed me coldly. Arestaurant manager told me he has no jobs. My cell phone broke andmy car died.

And Im really lonely. Without anyone oranything defining my days and setting my clock, I almost dont knowwho I am anymore.

Maybe theres a reason daydreams should staydaydreams why did I think this one would work? It was such anexciting idea.

One year earlier

April 1999

The boss was on his way, and thats notgood.

There are seven of us this Wednesday morning,the management group of a national association. Weve gathered inthe board room of our office suite that takes up most of the thirdfloor of the Chase bank tower in Arlington, Texas.

Normally, we like being in this room with itsmassive polished table and its walls lined with framed portraits ofthe organizations two dozen past presidents. The dcor is blue the carpet, the walls, and 15 upholstered chairs that rock, swiveland turn, moved by the occupants frustration, amusement,inspiration, annoyance, conflict, camaraderie and boredom typicallyserved up in any meeting.

We are employees of The Arc, a nationalorganization for people who have mental retardation. For most of my17 years here, Ive managed its communications program and,forsaking all others, I basically married the job. Like a long-timebut flawed marriage, there was passion in the early years, followedby a stretch of contentment and devotion. There has also been lotsof struggle to make it work, and boredom and fatigue. But alwaysIve loved it. And now, I face divorce. We all do.

We positioned our chairs with studiedcasualness. Weve already held the real meetings in numerousother places over several weeks. Weve traded information inclosed-door, desk-side exchanges of the latest rumors, in paranoide-mails and whispered interoffice calls, and standing in lunch-roomclusters, eyes watching the door.

Darth Vader is here. I hear hes going totell us something at 10:30, my colleague Jim had said early thismorning.

Darth Vader is one of several nicknamesweve tagged on the large and commanding executive director. Hiredby The Arcs board of directors just weeks ago, he charged into ourlives to launch Our Future Employment as grapevine topic No. 1.The new E.D. lives in Maryland, and it has become evident, inactions both official and alleged, that The Arcs electedleadership wants to move the headquarters to Washington, D.C.Without most of the staff. There simply isnt enough money to takeus along.

This is the man who will make the severancehappen.

He lumbered into the room late, distractedand nonchalant, settled into a blue chair and quickly got down tobusiness.

Im looking at space in Silver Spring, heannounced, and I note the language and cadence of Washington-speak.Its on the Metros Red Line, a 20-minute ride from the Hill,excellent space.

He added that the bank is eager to get itsthird floor back to accommodate its expanding operations. The Arcshould have no problem getting out of the lease early.

Darth Vader was short and to the point. Heinvited questions, but few of the covert looks that ricochetedamong us became audible communication, so he did what he usuallydid on his few Arlington visits spent a few hours and got back onthe plane for D.C. Sometimes he mutters an excuse for his abruptdepartures, but more often he just disappears. Who can blame him?Why sit there and stare at the unsmiling faces of the past?

The evening after his office spaceannouncement, I called my 85-year-old father in Kansas.

Hows Mr. Arc?! he cracked, using thenickname hed coined for the new boss. This always made me laughand as usual, he managed to remind me in an instant not to take myjob or myself too seriously.

Looks like the move is going to happen inDecember, Daddy.

Are you going to hunt for a new job?

What he meant was, I should get startedfinding new employment ASAP. Thats certainly what Rodney Smithwould do, not that he had to in mid-20th century America. Hed beenloyal to the Sinclair Pipeline Co. for 25 years, and they had beenloyal to him, and thats the way employment worked in thosedays.

Y-yeah, I guess so. Look for a new job.Sure.

It was true that one day in an airportbookstore, I picked up a book on job hunting. ALL THE HELP YOULLEVER NEED, its cover trumpeted in vivid red and yellow graphics. Ibought it even though it hurt my eyes.

Actually, it hurt my psyche. The truth was, Ididnt want another job. I couldnt bear the thought of anothercareer position of day-in day-out routine. In recent years, nomatter what I did to stay motivated, the overall sameness of lifewas getting to me. Days gave way to weeks. Months fell away andseasons changed. Every year cycled the same events at the sametimes: January planning, quarterly newspaper production, boardmeetings, fund-raising letters, Summer Training, fall convention.In the non-profit world, theres never enough money, and we seemedto always be reshuffling the deck of chronic problems and thin,under-funded solutions. I was tired.

One night I was having dinner at an east FortWorth Italian restaurant with my older sister Martha andbrother-in-law Paul Gordon. Over Spaghetti Puttanesca and a beer, Idecided to introduce the subject of my daydream.

Wouldnt it be interesting I began, to,uh, get in the car and leave town for a while. Say, a year. And notjust drive around America, but stop here and there to spend somereal time. Get little jobs and make friends and do volunteer thingsand otherwise, just do what there is to do there but then move onto the next place after a month or two.

There. Id said it. This was an idea that hadbecome stuck in my head. It had lurked there at least 30 years,ever since Id read John Steinbecks Travels with Charlie as ateenager, and Studs Terkels