Six years ago today, I started working at the business I’m still at now.  (And yes, I know that sentence was grammatically atrocious.) Having started working in the professional world at the beginning of the dot-com age, six years is an awfully long time to spend in one place, since my longest run somewhere before this was only 16 months. 

Six years ago, I left everything behind — friends, family, a lifelong existence in the Northeast, a career in another industry — and followed a job out to Los Angeles, simply because I needed to start over.  I had no idea what the future would hold, only that I needed a fresh start somewhere new with new people and another attempt to get back into the career field I love doing something I enjoyed.  I started off at the lowest rung on the ladder, making nothing and knowing three people in the entire city of L.A., and I slowly built my way up both professionally and socially, making a life for myself out here.  I’ve gone against the odds:  people back East who said I’d never leave New York or New England, and people at work who told me I’d never reach a position I wanted.  I’ve survived a corporate takeover that decimated our staff and rose to a position and level of recognition in my career field that I desired, and I’ve acclimated (mostly) to a life where the sun sets instead of rises and the ocean’s on the left side instead of the right. 

It’s been quite a ride, and I finally feel like I’ve come into my own.  I can’t imagine not having made this leap now, and I am thankful that I did — it would’ve been easy to continue down the path I was headed, but it wouldn’t have brought me the experiences and the personality-shaping events that I’ve been privileged to undergo over the past six years.  I only wonder what the next six years have in store.