When I Nearly Died I Got Something Better Than a White Light

You don’t have to wait until 90 to get clarity.

Photo by Radu Florin on Unsplash

I’d just arrived in San Francisco. I was 2,403 miles from home and was alone in my adopted city. I didn’t have a single friend. I had $800 to my name, an apartment lease and no job. After completing grad school, I needed to leave my home state of Michigan. I was impossibly young, hopeful and ready for a fresh start. I didn't have big dreams. Mostly I wanted to carve out a small plot of independence for myself.

My life will change in San Francisco I intoned to myself.

I packed just the essentials (clothes, a stash of books and journals to memorialize my adventures) and gave my cat a sedative for the journey. I landed in San Francisco just before Dick Clark’s clock announced a fresh new set of 365 days. I wandered by Bepples pie shop on the way to dinner. I stopped in for an application and left 30 minutes later with a job. I’d worked my way through school working at cafes. I thought even a small stream of money would soothe my parent’s fear I’d run dry before I found a proper job with benefits.

I served pie, smiled at unruly customers and dodged big rodents in the kitchen for six weeks before landing a gig as an assistant manager at a Gap Kids. It was a place to start. Somewhere in there…