The pace of events necessary to get to Saudi Arabia has been considerably slower than I would like.  I finally seem to have been officially acknowledged by those responsible for getting me to KAUST.  The paperwork has been submitted for my Saudi visa.  Now I must hurry and wait some more.  The current schedule has me traveling to the KSA at the end of January or early February.  I have been reading much about what life may be like at KAUST.  It's difficult to comprehend the nature of the Saudi culture from my U.S.A vantage point.   Having lived with a very "womens rights" kind of wife for 30 years and being a firm believer in the notion of individual rights I am intimidated at the censorship and scrutiny that awaits me.  The longer I am forced to wait, the more nervous I become.  It's silly, of course.  As the old Doris Day song says, "que sera, sera" or "what will be, will be".  (for you kids, Doris Day was very popular actress and singer in the 50s and 60s.)

I have recently returned to reading and listening to Dr. Wayne Dyer, a well-known writer and speaker on self development.  His focus in recent years has assumed a distinctly spiritual flavor which I, as an agnostic, have trouble digesting completely.  Nonetheless, there is a great deal of practical wisdom in his writing.  I'm in the midst of  "Change Your  Thoughts -  Change Your Life", a book which offers a thoughtful analysis of the Tao Te Ching.   Dr. Dyer spent a year writing this book and it offers a lot of useful advice of how the Tao applies to life today.  The 37th verse of the Tao says, in part:

By not wanting, there is calm,

and the world will straighten itself.

When there is silence,

one finds the anchor of the universe within oneself.

I have to keep reminding myself that all will come in its own time; that one should embrace the now because it's the only thing that exists. 

Decision Made

I am now moving forward with my journey to Saudi Arabia and KAUST.  After much discussion with my family, we've agreed it's the right decision.  Now I have to get final approval; medical, personal, etc..  If that all goes well, around the 1st week in January I'll be off on my new adventure.  It will be hard to concentrate on my current job in the meantime.  I have been advised not to give notice until I receive visa approval from SA so I have to buckle down for now.    I also have a ton of work to do to at home.  Just the contemplation of being gone has generated a todo list a mile long.  Fixing and painting and getting this done and contacting that person.....it's much easier to let things slide when there's always tomorrow or next week to fall back on. 

Let the journey begin.

Passages to be?

I've never "blogged" before and I'm trying it now, not to enlighten others, but to give myself a forum in which I can echo my thoughts back to myself. Initially this blog will likely be self-indulgent. So be it. As time passes I hope to provide more third party insight into events to come. For now, however....

It's beginning to look like my life is about to pass into a new phase. Well into my 5th decade of life, I've always joked that I "still don't know what I want to be when I grow up". Sad but true. I am on the brink of leaving a life spent in the good old USA "work-a-day" world for new and uncharted territories. KAUST (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology) is calling and I'm listening. Located on the eastern shores of the Red Sea, KAUST is "an international, graduate-level research university dedicated to inspiring a new age of scientific achievement in the Kingdom that will also benefit the region and the world. KAUST is the realization of a decades-long vision of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud." KAUST is in it's first year so I'd be joining on the ground floor working on staff in the IT department.

I would be leaving my family and all the security I've ever known to work in an unknown land. It's at once frightening and exhilerating! I've been pouring over the blogs of those who have made the leap already and none seem to regret it. My career in IT in the States has been successful but is becoming stultifying. I already spend most weeks several hundred miles from home for my current job......but this would be several thousand. Is personal growth and opportunity worth the sacrifice I'm asking of my family? I just don't know. I'm sure many would condemn such a move as perfidy of the highest order. I know that, today, I am not offering my family the best of me. I am lost in an urban wilderness with little direction and less joy in life. To take liberties with Shakespeare (he writes of death while I dream of life) I think he captures the nature of the conumdrum (and fear) I'm facing.

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

Change which impacts those we love is difficult enough when thrust upon us with no choice. At least then we can assuage our guilt with the knowledge that the decision was not ours to make. We move ahead making the best of whatever situation we encounter. Embracing change when not forced to is something else. Change that is a benefit for one may not be a benefit for all. It may (and is likely to) engender pain and sadness. The question becomes a quest for outcomes. Does the potential for long-term gain for everyone balance the (hopefully) short-term pain that will result? For better or for worse I am going to make this decision in the next week.