kites on replay

The last couple of days I can't stop from asking myself, "What am I doing here?" My immediate self-reply is to stop being melodromatic, of course it's hard when you first move and soon you'll settle in and it can't really be as stifling as when you were in high school and you just need to have a good attitude. You came here to test out your documentary filmmaking dreams, remember? I remind myself that if I don't try out this documentation intuition now....when will I ever stop holding myself back?

But my wisdom isn't reaching to the depth of that question: what am I doing here.

"Here" is a small town, population just under 7,000, in North Dakota where the descriptives "rural" and "remote" are redundant. "Here" is where bananas and milk are expensive, asparagus a delicacy, and the only place in town to really buy clothes or books are at thrift stores–which is at once lovely, amusing, and limiting. 

This is the place we have lived since I was three, where I grew up during the years where you feel uncomfortable and awkward because you don't know who you are so you voraciously read books, sometimes to the exclusion of all else. I could elaborate further on the finer points of youth in rural towns and how in comparison I prosaically, unintentionally march to the beat of my own drum, but that's not the point. 

I could also begin listing the reasons I should have stayed where I was. Why did I feel compelled to tear myself away from enjoyable and stimulating friends some of whom really saw me and appreciated me and vice versa–a thing which is to be treasured when found, particularly since it is the first time I had found it; or the great outdoors of hiking and swimming holes and camping and even treasured winter walks; and my dear sister, brother-in-law, and baby nephew, and my cousin J...

The only thing missing was a career direction. I could have cancelled this move, accepted/applied to that film-related job offer that came mid-summer. But I didn't, it seemed it would still leave me with all the same questions about why I want to work with film.

What am I doing here? This is not about the difficulty of change, I'm trying to discern the future, I want so much to see just a few steps ahead. I can rehearse without much thought the rough outlines of the documentary project that popped into my head last September and which is why I'm hear now but it is still so abstract.

It will be until I start filming and even more-so editing.

And I'm beginning to think the question I keep asking myself is integrally linked to the project I set for myself. When I let it ring out loud and clear, "What am I doing here?" I actually feel moved upon to get out of bed and search out the answer. It awakens all my demons but also calls out my backbone. Oh blah, blah, blah, I just have to keep going and soon we shall see.


Right? Oh yes, we'll see (said in a quixotic/inscrutable/ironical/mellow/curious tone of voice)