As with the parking, I've said it before, but it needs to be said again: I will not miss Ed's job. I know Ed will in some ways of course - he's made some good connections, gotten excellent training, enjoyed the buzz of working in a hotshot Manhattan investment bank. And it has given us the career and financial boost we came here for. But even he is getting giddy about kissing the cubicle, and rat race, buh-bye. It's a little thrilling to check the work calendar and realize anything more than 3 weeks out is not his problem.
I would guess that his average workday over the last three years has been about 9 to midnight (plus commute), and about 5-8 hours on the weekend. That means severe sleep deprivation and total life imbalance on both our parts, me managing one and then two kids all day from breakfast to bedtime, and overnight now that we think of it. Place that in New York with its own special little hassles and it's been tough. Ed's job is the first reason we're leaving.
We expect his new job to be better. Even if he works the exact same hours I will at least be near friends and family for some support, and have somewhere to park my car when I come home. But we expect those late nights to become more the exception than the rule, plus a shorter commute.
In our early years of marriage we used to go on evening walks along the Boulder Creek path and talk about our future - where to live, what to do, children and parenting. Ed was studying business and we would talk about the various career choices he would have upon graduation. Consulting sounded brutal, traveling 4 or 5 days a week. Investment banking didn't sound much better, with unbelievably long work weeks. Plus I didn't want to live in New York, a likely location. So of course that's what we did. When Ed was interviewing for jobs our friend Bryan Waite told us of his buddy who had come to NY in investment banking. He said the first few years were tough, then he started really raking in the money, bought a big house in Jersey, put the kids in private school, and found himself miserable but stuck in the life he had created. It was a great cautionary tale that we have kept in mind over the years, and I'm relieved to be getting out.
2 comments:
This is definitely a totally understandable reason as to why you want to leave. Blake's job has much better hours than this, and we're totally enjoying our time here, but a home in some normal-sized town (with more grass in it) is where I picture myself settling down more permanently. We'll see what happens. Anyway, I hope Ed likes his new job better!
Making the life you really want is tricky work.
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