The Anatomy of a Goodbye

Leaving Austin feels different.

Not in the dramatic, cinematic, slam-the-car-door-and-speed-off-into-your-new-life way.
Not in the “run as fast as you can before the universe catches on” way I’ve done before.

Just… different.
Quieter.
Clearer.
More grounded.

It’s funny — when I think back on all the times I’ve left somewhere before, I can see now how young I was in my own mind, even when I wasn’t technically young at all.

Eighteen and Running Toward Freedom (and Away From My Giant Turtle)

I’ve left places before. At 18- I moved away from the only place I’d ever known to a city 6 states away. I had just graduated, ready to carve out a new life, and I cut off nearly everyone I’d known in high school—friends who had been part of my world for years—because I was convinced starting fresh meant starting clean. No lingering ties, no familiar voices, just a blank slate to build the life I thought I needed. I moved away, full of hope and urgency, thinking this was exactly what had to be done.

A college move hits different. Its almost a rite of passage. It’s the first of many things. Living on your own- or with roommates. Figuring out a new city and how to navigate it . Learning who you are all at the same time. It was exhilarating and nerve-wracking all at the same time. But I often kept the nervousness hidden. I figured since I was on the one making the choice to go to college far away- I didn’t have the ” right” to be nervous. That I could only be joyful and excited. That’s why homesickness hit me hard- like a freight train, but no one knew. I spent nights crying into my pillow… and into the giant stuffed turtle I insisted on bringing with me. (For the record, a life-size stuffed animal is not practical in a dorm the size of a shoebox. He lasted one semester before getting “honorably discharged.” )

Twenty-Two and Running Toward a Life I Thought I Was Supposed to Want

At 22 I was engaged- and we(I) was ready to start the next chapter. Hurry up and close the college one- show everyone that you have guts and courage and move across the country to start your new life. Do things that you convince yourself no one else is doing and therefore perhaps you’re ” better” than everyone. I’m not proud of it- but that’s the mindset I was in. Doing things for me, yes, but also to prove others wrong, or to top them.

Ironically, I pretty much repeated the pattern. I didn’t purposefully cut ties with my college friends, but I didn’t actively maintain those connections either. I convinced myself I was doing something far greater than anyone back home, leaving behind the lives they were slipping back into, the routines they were settling for. In reality, I was running again—running toward a life I thought I wanted, and away from the questions I didn’t yet know how to ask myself

The move to San Diego was something I wanted—but I rushed it. The day after graduation, we were back in Connecticut packing everything up, and not even two weeks later, we flew across the country. The urgency wasn’t about starting a new job or having a plan—it came from within. That feeling I now recognize as a kind of “get away at all costs.” I was running toward the life I had been conditioned to believe I wanted, but in truth, I was running from myself. I didn’t yet know how to pause, question, and look inward to understand why I was doing what I was doing—or whether it was even what I truly wanted

That’s not to say that I didn’t love those 8 years in San Diego- I absolutely did .Those eight years were full of growth, change, discomfort, and self-discovery… all things I had no vocabulary for at the time. Its where I really started to learn about myself, who I was, and what I wanted. I just didn’t know how to convey that to anyone else- and I hurt people along the way to my own self discovery. A story for another time.

Leaving San Diego (Take One): No Tears, No Roots, No Real Goodbyes

I don’t remember feeling sadness when I left San Diego that first time 8 years later. I attribute it to the fact that even though I lived there for 8 years- I never really connected to the city- or anyone there. It never felt like ” home”. Sure I had friends- several of whom met us out on the road- but I had my husband. I didn’t “need anyone” else. And even though we never said it out loud to one another- not then, and still not to this day- that trip was last ditch effort to repair the fractures in our marriage. As one friend put it-” if you can survive traveling with each other for a year- there’s absolutely no way your marriage will ever end”.

That’s… a lot of pressure to put on two people quietly falling apart.

So I buried the nerves, the anxiety, the weight of those words, and hyped myself up. Don’t get me wrong- I was excited, elated, -I was doing something I had wanted to do for many years-I just didn’t allow myself to feel the spectrum of emotions. I didn’t understand duality then.

Leaving San Diego (Take Two): Running Hard, Running Fast

Years later, leaving San Diego for the second time was not poetic or profound.
It was survival.
It was escape.
That city held memories and pain I was nowhere near ready to process. It held a lot of struggles. It held a lot of hurt. I convinced myself that a fresh start somewhere was what I needed to even be able to sort through the mess. The move was tumultuous- also a story for another time- and the writing was all over the wall that I was running, from this place, from myself. But I pressed on- and I got really good at convincing everyone this was the right move.

It wasn’t.
Not in the way I hoped.
But I didn’t know any better yet.

Looking back, I can see the pattern clearly now. Every move, every departure, wasn’t just about geography—it was about trying to outrun something inside me. At 18, it was high school and a life that felt too small. At 22, it was a carefully constructed vision of what I thought I should be, who I should be with, and where I should live. Eight years in San Diego, and I was still learning how to navigate the terrain inside my own heart.

There’s a duality to leaving that no one ever warns you about. There’s the thrill of possibility—the blank slate, the unknown, the chance to reinvent yourself. And then there’s the ache: the uncertainty, the fear, the quiet mourning for what you’re leaving behind. You feel both exhilarated and hollow, full and empty, ready and unprepared. The two exist simultaneously, and for a long time, I tried to ignore the second half of that equation.

I’ve realized it’s not about escaping the past or erasing the people and places you leave behind. It’s about carrying the lessons, the heartbreaks, and even the missteps with you—allowing them to inform who you are without letting them dictate who you become.

So each goodbye, no matter how rushed, messy, or reluctant, has been part of a longer story: a story about listening to that quiet voice that tells you when it’s time to move, even if it doesn’t make sense to anyone else. And maybe that’s the trick—to honor both sides of leaving: the excitement of what’s next and the reverence for what you’re leaving behind. Because the truth is, neither exists without the other.

And Now… Leaving Austin

Which brings me here.
Packing again.
But not urgently.
Not frantically.
Not to prove anything to myself or anyone else.

Just moving forward.

Austin was never meant to be forever — but it was meant to be important.
A bridge.
A soft place to land after years of hard places.
A chapter between who I was and who I’m becoming.

It taught me that leaving doesn’t have to mean fleeing.
That starting over doesn’t have to mean erasing everything that came before.
That I can hold gratitude and sadness at the same time.

That I can love a city and still know it’s time to go.

Duality — finally understood.

And as I tape up the boxes- of which there are only three, I feel it:

No ache of escape.
No rush.
No running.

Just a quiet knowing:
I can go.
I can stay.
And either way…
I’ll still be okay.

-A