I've been told that I set a new record for the number of leaving parties. I find that hard to believe - I had stiff competition - but certainly I knew there were a lot of people I was going to miss and I wanted to say goodbye properly to them all. I had moved to Germany to join a company dominated by ex-pats, which had always been very social and I'd been very active in that. It did strike me that I might find working alone very hard for that reason (Future post: Working Alone).
Deciding to leave Germany and go it alone - that's a big topic all of it's own that I'll not go into here, or I'll never get started (Future post: Is It For Me?) Suffice to say that life had thrown me a couple of months to think, travel and put things in perspective and this was the conclusion I reached. There had been a building feeling for a long time that I was tired of talking about the things I believed I could do, without doing them and the experiences I wanted to have that weren't happening. If you can do what you want to do part-time, around a permanent job, I've heard a lot of people recommend that and more power to you. I'd found that wasn't working.
I felt my life had been "on hold" for a long time and I needed to get it on the move again because I had a lot of catching up to do. That was pretty much the single driving motivation behind the next two years!
I sent the first of my stuff home on the 3rd of November and I flew home about 6 weeks later, just before Christmas. Going from all the collected possessions of a settled existence to the few essentials of a peripatetic lifestyle takes some work (Future Posts: Getting Rid Of Your Stuff and Storing It).
But apart from packing, what else did I do in that time?
For a start, I made some great new friends! The thing is, when you're about to leave is when life gets exciting. At least, that's the case for me, I can't help thinking it should apply to everyone and I don't think there's anything remarkable about it either. You want to make the most of your time and suddenly you know that if you don't do it now - chances are you never will. I went to the parties I had turned down, I saw the sights I hadn't visited, I stayed to chat with the neighbours I'd never talked to, and this somewhat reserved soul got a lot bolder with women. (Yes - as I expect you've assumed by now, I was single. Future Post: Relationships)
In short, in those weeks I did more living than I'd done there in the previous year. It was a good way to finish - and a good start.
But what about all the boring stuff? And indeed, the important stuff.
There was a lot to be taken care of, in packing up and leaving my apartment but also in preparing for my new life and work. The next few posts describe my experience of that and give a few tips.
One final bit of preparation: organising my plans for Christmas and New Year. It's the best time of year to catch up with friends and family in the UK and I made the most of it.
I didn't make any New Year resolutions - everything I had been doing up to that point was putting in motion a whole new chapter in my life. And - I should make it clear now! - I had a lot of ideas about what I was going to do with it, but I didn't plan to spend all this time as an itinerant programmer. But that's what happened. I hope you'll enjoy my account - and maybe learn something useful to you along the way.
YMMV
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