PNQ

I just submitted my personal narrative questions! They were...not that great. I started off with this plan to hit all of the 13 dimensions and the 6 whatever-elses in as many questions as possible, but then life happened, and I kind of gave up. There's a quality the foreign service is looking for! Ugh.

I think I chose some great experiences, but I didn't answer the questions strategically. I'm also not sure I explained the situations very clearly. I honestly just wanted to finish writing, hit submit, and have the questions be someone else's problem for a while.

Can you tell that my motivation for joining the foreign service has flagged? I think this is probably normal considering the process is so long and can seem like such a long-shot. Meanwhile, life continues all around me, and I need to focus on living it. I've become more invested in fixing up our house (it was built in 1925, so there's plenty to do), moving into a different teaching position next year, learning French, and trying hard to spend a little more time living in the present.

I also keep weighing the pros and cons of joining the service in the first place. The pros are always clear to me, but the cons come and go depending on what else is going on in my life. Lately, the biggest con is that my partner won't be able to work. That will be a big loss for us financially– maybe not in the immediate present since the service takes care of major costs like housing, but it will have a big impact on our retirement. And if I never make it into the senior foreign service one day, I'll be out and looking for a job before I'm ready to retire. That's scary.

As far as living in other countries, I'm mostly okay with that except when it comes to one thing: food. I'm big on healthy eating, and I know that a lot of my American luxuries cannot be found abroad. Even some basic items that I like to use in my cooking will be unavailable. And there are also safety issues with food in a lot of developing countries. I'm a little bit obsessive when it comes to my food, so that would be a huge adjustment. That sounds silly, but it's a big deal for me.

There are also days when I worry a lot about being gay in certain countries. I know that some countries absolutely will not allow me to bring my partner, which means we risk being separated for two years. I would be really upset if I couldn't share two years of my life with him. In many other countries, we will have to be very discreet about the nature of our relationship. I'm used to that, but I really don't like it. I also love living in a city with a very active gay community. My partner sings in a gay men's chorus, we have a lot of gay friends, there's a gay theater group, community organizations, parties, and so on. I've spent so much of my life feeling like an outsider, so it's great to feel "at home" around people like me. That's not a problem in Western Europe, but in a lot of places there is no gay community, or if there is it's very hard to tap into as a foreigner. This isn't a deal breaker, but it's a definite annoyance.

But there are also days where I'm just so bored with my life here in the States. I mean, it's okay. I don't hate it. But there's a lot of routine. My partner was going through some photos he took in Korea when we lived there, and it brought back so many memories. It felt like we were constantly MAKING MEMORIES there, whereas now I feel like we're just living our lives. There won't be much to remember, and the months and years just run together. I don't want that for my life or for our relationship.

I'm not sure what I want exactly. If someone offered me a position in the foreign service right now, I would definitely take it. But I would have some reservations. I know that's normal. I guess what I'm trying to do now is to get the rest of my life to "normal" so that I can be happy no matter the outcome.

I'm rambling. The important thing: PNQs are done, and now the long wait begins.