One year ago, I found out I was upgraded to JET.

I had given up all hope; I was at my darkest point. Even as I was setting up an interview for another company, I figured I would fail that too, just like everything else. I was lost. Japan was so far away from me, and something that had seemed to sure and so right was now something so impossibly unattainable. The more I wanted it, the more the dream of living and working in Japan slipped out of my fingers.

Until I got my chance back, that lonely night in a hotel in Boston, like nothing had happened. My fortunes had changed so abruptly that it was almost like…like someone had planned it that way. I don’t know if I believe in God, but it sort of felt like my two months of suffering (which was really nothing in the grand scheme of things) was there to show me something. No matter how much I thought I deserved Japan, I had only just made it. I had eked through by the skin of my teeth. Only now that I realized how hard it was could I really appreciate what was being given to me.

It’s easy to forget that. It’s easy to get upset at random things here, to get moody. Heck, I got in a snit yesterday for having no plans this weekend, even though I am exhausted lately and really need a break. Well, I’ve always been moody, but sometimes, especially in the beginning, it was so hard for me to break out of it. Everyone I met was new. I was always trying to prove myself. I was on my own for the first time. A relationship I had been in for years was over. I got a crush on someone where the constant will they or won’t they drove me crazy (don’t lie, i still feel this way). For a while, I started liking someone else who treated me horribly, but in a way, I felt I deserved it. I was lonely. I felt like no one understood me, and that no one ever would.

But…after that JET passed away in January, something changed inside of me. I remembered just how lucky I have it, just to be alive. I remembered how little time we really have. And I remembered just how unbelievably lucky I was to be in Japan, because I had forgotten and taken for granted my job and my life here and the fact that it had been so hard. It’s difficult to remember that sometimes. But everytime something gets me upset, I just take a second, take a walk, take a bike ride, and pay attention to the world around me. I wouldn’t have had a chance to see this, if I hadn’t gotten so lucky. I take another breath. It’s fun here, even if I fail. Even if I am lonely. Even if things don’t go my way. Because I am here.

And that’s all it takes to get me on the right track. Maybe those couple of months last year, when I thought I had screwed everything up and would never get back here, were my reminder. They were a way of telling me that even when things get tough here, it was still so much better than last year, so quit whining and appreciate what you have. I didn’t know it at the time, but I guess I wouldn’t erase those two months for anything.