A year from now ...

With most jobs, when you want to leave, you give a reasonable notice, a month or more if you're nice, two weeks to stay within the norm.

With the JET program, the re-contracting process for the August 2009 to August 2010 year has already begun, with information about what to do circulating, meetings on the process looming, and various colleagues asking if you're planning to stay.

In case you've lost track, I'm now at the beginning of my second JET year. It started in August and lasts until next August. But I'm right in the middle of thinking over whether I'll stay for a third year. I have to make this final decision by the end of January, and it's not an easy decision to make.

There are plenty of factors. But perhaps more interesting to start with are the option:

1. Stay with JET on my current job for a third year.

2. Return to the U.S. First, of course, to Oregon, and then to wherever I can find a job in journalism.

3. Return to the U.S. and dive right into grad school for journalism (but where? And with what money?)

4. Leave the JET program but find a new job in Japan, be it in media or education, in another location.

5. Attend grad school somewhere other than the U.S., like the University of Hong Kong's journalism program (again, money?)

Those, as of now, are the wide list of options, which include the easy to pull-off (staying another year; returning home) and the difficult to imagine (grad school in Hong Kong? Really?). But that's where I am now.

And as of now I'm not learning heavily in any direction. There are times when I think that I'd love to be back to living in the states. There are other times when it's hard to imagine leaving this school and the students and teachers I've come to know. Then there are times when I'm drawn to journalism, be in practicing or studying.

There are times I'm drawn to normal, that is, being home. But then I'm immediately pulled back to the sense of adventure that comes with living abroad. Sometimes I'm bothered by the routine being the same every day; the course work the same each year. But then I realize even if the material is the same, the students are new.

Sometimes I'm happy to be in the workforce, earning a paycheck instead of running up debt to academia. But then I miss being a student, or I'm drawn to the idea of earning that master's degree or lining myself up for a top tier internship with a major news organization. And while it's nice to be working and earning, even if you like your job, work is work, the morning is the morning, and stress is stress.

And the point of this writing isn't to flesh out my ideas, but to share them. This is where I am now, which is, nowhere near a decision. Perhaps later I could expand on the pros and cons of the above choices. Maybe you have your own thoughts you want to share here or in an e-mail. Maybe you'll just wait it out, and let the suspense build.

For now, the the larger question looming on my horizon is: what's for dinner tonight?