There's a fork in the road, up ahead. I can see it drawing ever-nearer. I'll either be going left or right...and right now, I don't really know for sure which way it'll be.
Worse, I'm moving at such a varied speed that I don't even know when that fork will actually arrive right in front of me and I'll have to choose.
The left fork: University.
I put in an application for Monash University's postgraduate education degree. I did the same last year, but this year I did it properly. With the desired results - although acceptance to this year's course was apparently very difficult, I made the cut.
For those who aren't familiar with the Australian education system...in order to teach, you have to be officially qualified. There's 4-year uni undergraduate degrees that focus on teaching only, called Bachelor of Education. There's two general options - all-round for primary school, or specializing in two areas for secondary school. A postgraduate education degree is a one-year 'crash-course' in teacher training and methods; it's added on top of a non-education degree (such as a BA, or a degree in Mathematics). Basically, it allows you to then go and teach your subject area with official recognition.
Me, I'm building on my Semicha and moving into secondary education. My two chosen methods (the only ones I could pick, actually) were Jewish Studies and Languages Other Than English (LOTE) - Hebrew.
I've already enrolled and have paperwork already starting to stack up. A criminal record check is standard-issue necessary for teachers in Australia (and probably elsewhere as well) and fees coming due early next month.
That's on the left.
The right: Me heading off to the US of A.
I'm 26 and for someone in my religion that's past the typical marriage age. (Not that I ever claimed to be typical.) I've been to Israel, I've checked out the local possibilities here in Melbourne and...well, not a whole lot going on here.
The main area that people from Chabad go for these things is New York. So I'm busy trying to see if I can find productive work within a 300 mile radius of there.
That's actually the more important one at the moment. I can get an intermission from university for 12 months without much trouble at all, so...
Wish me luck in my search!