As many of you found out yesterday, we have news! (And no, we’re not pregnant.) Jesse is quitting his job in March to go back to school for computer animation.
This decision was a long time coming. It’s almost hard for me to believe it’s actually happening.
We had been talking about the need for change for more than a year now, but deciding on what that change needed to be took a some time. At the beginning of last year, we explored the animation school option but the plan derailed about midway through spring semester, and we both gave up on the idea. Before the idea died, though, we saved up a decent chunk of change…then summer rolled around, and I decided to use some of that money to spend a month in San Francisco. Jesse got a keytar.
You know this part of the story already: Jesse came out to SF for the first week. We had a fabulous time, eating wonderful food, seeing wonderful sights. And we also ventured into the East Bay to visit Berkeley and to check out Emeryville, which happens to be home of Animation Mentor, the school Jesse had looked into earlier in the year. He had mentioned the possibility of touring the school’s headquarters, and I said why not? Might as well.
We toured the offices and asked a million questions, and when we walked out into the late-afternoon sunshine, Jesse turned to me and said, “I want to do this. I need you to hold me to this when I change my mind. I really want to do this.”
Honestly, I was thrilled. When I first started dating Jesse–twelve years ago–he wanted to pursue animation. All through college, it was animation. But as we moved into “adulthood” and all the responsibility that comes along with that, the dream looked more and more improbable. Every now and then, I’d bring it up, asking him if he ever thought about going back to school, making a career change. I’ve known for a while now that animation was his passion, and that he needed to at least give it a shot.
And now, it was finally going to happen.
That day, we launched into the plans. How much money did we have? How much could we possibly save before next year? How much of a deficit would we have between our expenses and my salary? What would we do about health insurance? We rode the BART over to Berkeley and walked the eucalyptus-lined campus, shopped along Telegraph Avenue, just off campus. We talked numbers and ideas and fears and dreams. We ate dinner at Chipotle. It was July 7, 2011: Our seventh wedding anniversary.
Since then, we’ve been on a money-saving mission, socking away every single penny we could get our hands on. We’ll still need a small miracle to avoid going into debt, but we’re going to give it our best shot. And, really, I couldn’t be happier. In our marriage, we’ve done plenty of sacrificing so that I could pursue my dreams. I’m excited that we’re finally sacrificing something for Jesse’s dreams.
(Of course, one of my first thoughts was–ack, look at all this money I am spending to go to San Francisco, when the money could have been used for school! But the fact of the matter is, had we not gone to San Francisco that summer, we might not have made this decision after all. That trip was, hands down, one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.)
So, the details? The program is 18 months, with a potential six-month “master class” at the end (which he’ll probably take if we’re financially alive at that point). It’s all online, so no need to move anywhere. And with all the extra time he’ll be here at home, we’ve already started planning a walking schedule, how we’re going to eat lunch together the days I’m home, all the little things that fit into two flexible school schedules.
We’re excited. A little scared, too. But mostly excited.
