Brexit and me

Well, that's it, guys. Britain is out. As a proud resident of the EU since 2008, losing one of our biggest players hurts. But shaking my head should be where this all ends for me, but for what I just did earlier this week.

I got a job in England.

And still, everything should be fine, right? I'm an American. My visa requirements don't change when the UK jumps ship.

The thing is, I've been living in Denmark for a year, a country for which I acquired a visa to go with my job, and then my French boyfriend followed. He was able to freely move here, to job hunt with equal rights to the Danes, as an EU citizen. But language barriers can be a big hurdle, so the past year hasn't offered many opportunities to him. And then this UK-based job appeared. Suddenly (well, less than suddenly—the interview process took five months), we had a chance for a fresh start in an EU country where he spoke the local language. My job guaranteed my visa, and as an EU citizen, he could follow freely for his own job hunt, just like any other English local.

Today I'm left with a sensation half way between a punch in the gut and the feeling of teetering on the brink of an abyss. I have no idea what comes next. The UK will still be EU when we arrive, but the cogs of Brexit will be in motion. England and France are so close that there's sure to be some good terms negotiated. For goodness sake, there's a tunnel that connects the two countries! But how will English employers react? With an economy in crisis and the future rights of EU workers unknown, how many Englishmen will jump to hire a Frenchman?

For a week that had begun so upbeat, this really throws a wrench in the works. Why, England, why?

A Big Decision

The big interview day (Friday, Jan. 30) came and went in a bit of a blur. I confess to having been slightly more high-strung than necessary (read: understatement) especially given that I'd had the chance earlier that same week to give a departmental seminar at the Institut de la Vision in Paris on just the same topic on which I had to interview, but while I may work well in high-pressure situations, I make no such claims about the anticipatory period. Luckily, my talk went smoothly, and the people at DANDRITE (The Danish Institute for Translational Neuroscience) were smart, friendly, and engaging. And just let me say, if ever you find yourself in Aarhus (Denmark's second largest city), do not miss out on the restaurant Nordisk Spisehus, where my interview finished over a four-and-a-half hour dinner.

I made it back to the hotel that night completely overwhelmed: the aftertaste of 5+ courses fresh on my palate, science projects swirling through my head, and a fresh job offer in my hands. I felt nauseated.

Don't get me wrong, this is exactly what I wanted! This interview could hardly have gone better. But this left me with so much to consider, and suddenly everything was very real. What direction did I really want to take for my research trajectory? I'd whittled the list down to the spinal cord and the retina as two interesting neurological systems fairly accessible for biomedical intervention and critical for quality of life. This project would put me square in the world of the retina. But was the project sufficiently medically relevant? Did I want to join a totally new team? Was I looking principally for a scientific or an engineering environment? Would this project put me on a trajectory towards possibly running my own lab, and is that really what I want? Was it even okay to respond to this offer before getting a response from a fellowship to which I'd applied for a project in Switzerland? But with the response scheduled for late March, could I possibly afford to wait? And was I willing to risk spending the next half year applying for my own independent funding for that Swiss project, especially since my PhD research project hasn't yet been published, which seriously diminishes my chances of obtaining the funding I'd need? On the other hand, was I ready to move to Denmark, a country so random that I'd never even visited it before this interview? (Note: +1 brings my countries-visited grand total to 29.)

With all this spinning through my head and my stomach, I boarded a train the following morning back to Copenhagen, where I'd flown in the day before my interview. An unsuspecting Nicolas soon met me here, only to be bombarded by all my Big Life Questions. Luckily the Questions took some interludes for exploring a new city. It was our first time in Denmark and our first weekend of traveling as just the two of us.

Our weekend in Copenhagen following my job interview in Aarhus

Gotta admit, the Danish sense of humor really had me smiling throughout the weekend.

The city was completely charming, entertainingly quirky, and colder than I'd have liked. Our weekend slipped by in a flash, but my worries didn't escape me as quickly.

Over the next couple of weeks I met with, called, and skyped professional colleagues, former classmates, friends, and family. When was I supposed to have become ready to make such a big decision about the direction in which I take my career? And how would I know if I'd made the right decision?

Finally enough was enough. I packed my bags and emailed out to accept the job offer at Aarhus University. And then I closed up my computer and ran off to a foreign country. England. (Come on, you didn't think I was going to just pack a bag, move off to Denmark, and dive straight in without some time off for traveling first?)

My highlights from London. (Sensing a theme?)

Back in Paris, I am frantically trying to wrap up the publication of my PhD work, I'm playing travel hostess for a full calendar of Airbnb renters, and I'm continuing my battles to retain the right to reside in France and receive my unemployment benefits. (I'll let you know if that ever actually happens.) And in the background, the wheels are in motion for my grand pre-postdoc travels. But more on that later.