Waiting for New York

My Utah Mountains, My Utah Skies. Two things I'll miss.

"I've never seen him like this," I confided to Lizzie who was heroically sitting on the floor of my van while we and the kids waited in the Walmart parking lot in Rexburg, Idaho. We were visiting Lizzie for the weekend, and Hank had run out of milk. William had just run inside for some. "I've never seen him want something so badly."

Lizzie nodded. "It is an amazing opportunity."

We were waiting for the call from New York. A couple of weeks before, one of William's professors mentioned an internship opportunity at a prestigious design firm in Manhattan, inviting students to apply. William did. Then a week ago, they emailed him to set up a skype interview.

(Technology. Pretty darn brilliant. Amiright?)

Then they went and told him that, were he to be chosen as their intern (yes, folks - they choose but one), he would be working on the video installations for the 9-11 memorial.

Okay.

The thing you might not know is that my man is a brilliant storyteller. He writes stories that expand, shatter and then grow your heart. And he LOVES the storytelling aspect of graphic design.

The other thing you might not know is that since my man jumped with both feet into this Graphic Design field of his, he's been telling me and telling me that he wants to do something meaningful with it. He didn't want to create ads and images that trick people into thinking they needed to buy/look like/be something. He wanted to do something real.

And so, in the one o'clock hour on a random Tuesday, New York City dangled that golden carrot right in front of that man of mine's heart.

And oh, did it yearn.

I'd never seen him like that. He'd never been so inside himself - so deeply enveloped in the trenches of his thoughts. He swam there, somewhere down in the lakes of those cavernous insides, surfacing every twenty minutes or so briefly check his phone for any sign of an email from New York City.

"We'll have a decision by the end of the week," to William meant the work week. Friday.

Friday passed.

"Maybe the end-of-the-week is Sunday, and they'll tell you Monday." I offered. He nodded - no news was still good news - but oh, it ate at him. A stranger in another time zone dangled his fate from her fingers.

Saturday passed, and we tried to distract with a mini vacation to the sites and ice-creams of Rexburg, Idaho and his favorite sister.

Sunday passed - and we tried to drown it all out with an evening of games and starbursts - but still, every twenty minutes or so, I'd catch him sneak a peek at his phone. He'd notice me notice, and he'd give a touch of a smile and a shake of his head as if to say, "I know they're not going to email me on a Sunday, but I can't help myself."

Monday morning, as he grabbed his phone and the keys from his desk on his way out the door, he brightly said, "I'll probably hear sometime today, and I'll keep you posted."

I steeled myself for another long day of no news - seemed to me like this was a hard decision, and they probably hadn't concluded anything they wouldn't have known by Friday. We'd hear by the end of the day if today at all.

But at 8:07 AM I received this text (and I quote):

Check your email check your email check your email check your email check use.aldcykcunrk k your.

Gmail.

I ran downstairs to my computer and flung open my browser. Email. One from William. CLICK!

Inside, he said, 'I haven't even read it yet!' and attached was an email from Local Projects.

He starts two weeks from today.