Green Bay, WI

 I sit here, beer in hand, in the middle of Gate D at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, waiting to board a flight to Green Bay, Wisconsin, to meet the station offering me a job. I should be drafting questions for a crummy starter reporting contract, maybe figuring out what it would take from them to get me to say yes. But instead, I sit here, staring at a blank document, the cursor blinking back at me, waiting for my words to show up. I take another sip of my heavy, orange beer, willing some words, any words, to come. 

The bartender asks about my travel plans, and his face tightens when I say Green Bay. I can't help but mirror that grimace, remembering how I felt just last Friday when I saw the offer pop up on my phone. Valentine’s Day. A job offer that should have made me jump for joy. But instead, it left me frozen in my car, scrambling to figure out what the hell I was supposed to do. 

The bartender, sensing my hesitation, starts firing off questions about my career. Then, he asks the simple one: “Why Green Bay?” I should’ve had an easy answer. It’s market 68, a chance to start my career, a place with opportunities for good sports stories. But the emotional answer? I didn’t have one. And a month ago, I would have said it was a perfect place to start. But now? It’s just... Green Bay. 

I’ve always told myself that I’ll never be the girl who follows a guy. I’ll always be the girl who craves success in my career, above everything else. But why does my heart feel this tight, and why does panic rise in my chest when I think about leaving a place that’s starting to feel like home? A place where I’ve found someone I’m so in love with. The thought of being away for two years fills me with fear I hadn’t expected. Because, as much as I love my career, and the success I’m carving out for myself, I also love my naval academy officer more than I care to admit. And "we have time"? is starting to feel like a lie. 

Imagine my surprise when the station takes to me as much as I take to it. Within minutes of touring the place, they whisked me away to Lambeau Field, taking me to the restaurant inside the stadium. Packers players fill the room, and a posh crowd surrounds me, recreating the old Wisconsin charm of eating cheese curds in a beautiful setting. When I ask, ‘What else does Green Bay have to offer?’ I’m met with an uncomfortable pause, a struggle to find an answer... not much. 

As I look around, I start to notice the people staring, curious, as if I’m some kind of mystery. The rest of the day, I feel their eyes following me, almost like I don’t belong. Like I’m an East Coast girl trying to fit into the mold of a Midwestern one, as I once did, long ago. I was born with it, but never quite fit the mold. It never felt right, and maybe it still doesn’t. 

I sit in the airport on this bright Friday morning, black coffee in hand, and it hits me, it’s my birthday. I feel detached, the usual giddy excitement of another year passing by nowhere to be found. My head is spinning, consumed by the weight of my career. Instead of feeling a sense of accomplishment or excitement, I just feel… tired. Like I’m always moving, always chasing something, yet when I stop to check in with myself, I barely recognize where I’ve been or where I’m headed. 

The most me I’ve ever felt was right in the heart of Maryland, alone. Running around the college bars I’ve come to love, where I feel like I belong, where I can help spark change. It’s where I lost my first love, swimming, and where I found myself outside of my sport. Maybe my journey wasn’t meant to be in a place like Green Bay; maybe it’s meant to be chasing the feeling I get in Baltimore. 

The East Coast is full of complex dreams, ambitions that take years to cultivate, to shape and refine into something real. The Midwest, on the other hand, offers a beautiful but simple life, one that I choose not to afford in the chase of my dreams.  

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