Today is the first weekday that I’ve had free since my contract ended on Friday. I have many goals for this time in between chapters. I am not sure how long this time will be, but I plan to make the most of it.

If you are new to my blog, I am on the other side of a big move in 2013. In my former life I was a tenured faculty member at a private US liberal arts college. I was settled in my former city and we had a beautiful home and stable positions, but I never forgot how happy I was living in Australia in the late 1990s. I took a sabbatical to Wellington, New Zealand to explore options for leaving my faculty position and relocating to this part of the world. We chose New Zealand because the country has a need for engineers and it is a much easier to get residency here as a professional migrant from the US.

My job prospects in New Zealand were, shall we say, much shakier than my spouse’s because it is ridiculously hard to shift locations in academia, the US system is quite different than the NZ and AUS one (a job at my previous institution – or I should say TYPE of US institution – means basically nothing here), there are plenty of local Communications graduates from Otago and Massey (and thus little need for skilled migrants in this area).

I decided that going back into industry would be my best bet because I had some industry experience prior to completing my post-graduate degrees. I also kept up freelancing in the meantime to give myself some options. However, without a shortage of local Communications graduate in this well-networked and smaller job market, my options were quite small.

It’s been a year now. In that time, I’ve completed a contract job and got great experience. Although the process of getting settled here has been much more difficult than I anticipated, I definitely don’t regret making the move. I’ve grown a ton and have been placed in situations that stretched me. I also feel like myself again. I am really looking forward to the rest of this year as things begin to better settle and I reach toward goals.