7.14.2014

Lame Ducks in Williston

We brought this on ourselves.

Two years ago when we moved to Williston, the potential of moving away seemed so far away. We had never before in our married life lived somewhere longer than 13 months. Most people I meet here are also transplants. Common questions are "Where are you from? How long will you be here? Do you like it?" I don't really know where we are from. I am from Arizona. But Sam is from Utah, Alex from Ohio, Edison from New York, and I guess Declan is a North Dakota native. Our family doesn't have a place to claim. We usually say, "Texas." Although we only lived there for a wee bit over a year. Texas definitely wouldn't claim us!

Everyone we know here remembers that we set our timeline as "Williston: two years." We had no qualms about telling people that because it felt like a century to us. Other people probably saw it as a short time but we were telling them two years as if we would were permanent. But today marks two years in Williston, and we are still here.

In politics, the term "Lame duck" refers to someone whose term is about to expire and they cannot be reelected. I recall learning about that phrase in high school and being fascinated by it. Usually no one wants to listen to the lame ducks because they are on their way out and their opinion doesn't matter anymore. We are lame ducks in Williston.

I remember this starting around Christmastime. There is one guy who does not talk to Sam about anything except our "imminent" move, like we already have one foot out the door. The move we know nothing about. As the two year deadline approached I wanted to talk about it less and less. The plans we thought we had to go international after North Dakota just don't seem to be working out. We have no idea where we will be and when we will be going there.

I have started answering the questions about our expiration date, "We are here until we're not." Because who knows where we are headed and when? Not me.

 photo LameDucks_zpsa7f44cf9.jpg
Spotted around town, cruising for babes.

4 comments:

Jershelly said...

Do you guys have to move? Or you just want to move somewhere else?

Olivia said...

Hey, I'd love it if you remained a "lame duck!" 😉

Paxton said...

I hear New England is nice ;-) too bad I can't put in a vote of where and when you are moving! The waiting can be awful!!!!

Merkley Jiating said...

Shelly - We do not HAVE to move but Sam is in a rotational program and this has never been an end-point for us. We just don't know when or where we will be "rotated" next. :)

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