Angela Killian

It was November 2010 and the condo Joe and I were renting in downtown Orlando was being foreclosed on. We were being kicked out of our home and I was preparing to graduate from the University of Central Florida after 5 years of carefully laid plans.

I moved from Texas to Florida and took time off from school to work full time and establish residency, which took 2 years. The biggest plans I had for my life at that time amounted to “get Florida residency”, “graduate from UCF”. I had accomplished both and had no clue what I wanted to do next.

I had been dating a guy for 6 months (Joe) and he had big plans to move to Thailand to work and travel around Asia. He had been there once on a Southeast Asia backpacking trip and I trusted his judgment so I was onboard without much thought. I received student grants my last semester (thanks, President Obama!) so I had enough savings for my one way ticket. I knew that I didn’t want to go back to Texas and I absolutely wanted to be with Joe, so the choice was easy.

Joe already had a job lined up for himself and a work visa, but I had nothing to speak of. It’s nearly impossible to obtain any jobs in Thailand unless you walk into the office. I had my teaching certificate so I knew I would be able to find something, even if it was part-time. I embellished the availability of teaching jobs to my family because they were pretty much freaking out. I tried to get a dependent visa from Joe’s visa, but it was impossible because we were not married. I luckily obtained a 3 month tourist visa after mailing my passport and documents to the Thai consulate in Coral Gables, so I had some time to figure out the job situation.

We had a small going away gathering with a group of friends. We went to all the places we knew we’d miss in downtown Orlando – I-Bar, Urban Flats and BBQ Bar. Luckily we had done all our packing beforehand. Because the condo was being foreclosed on, we decided to leave the furniture. The front door didn’t lock properly because of a drunken kicking incident so we sent a mass text to our friends to come by and take whatever they wanted. I was sad to leave my fabulous bedding and feather pillows, but we had no space to bring them. We had already given Joe’s mom 5 plastic containers full of keepsakes, so we couldn’t give her any more. I left a huge container of OPI nail polish, piles of shoes, a closet full of winter clothing and all the furniture, decorations and kitchen accessories. I was ridding myself of clutter.

Through the hang over haze I felt a little bit anxious knowing that would be the last time I’d see Orlando for a while. My backpack weighed about 50 pounds and I couldn’t lift it onto my back without Joe’s help. We literally sold our cars on the way to the airport so I had $2,000 USD to get me through until my first paycheck. The Carmax employee handed me the plates off my car and instructed me to return them to the state. If only he knew how hard I had to work to change my Texas plates to be Florida plates for tuition purposes. Our friend who volunteered to drive us to the airport also took on the job of returning the plates.

I hobbled onto the airport curb with my overloaded backpack, took one look at the Orlando sun descending, took a deep breath and was ready for the next chapter.