I have had various versions of this post rolling around on paper, in my journal, and in my head. None of them seem just right. And I have moaned about it previously here. And if I checked, I would probably realize that those moanings are getting closer and closer in time, becoming more frequent.
This place. I like very little about this place. I have come far enough down this thought process that we know that it is the physical location and amenities associated with this place. It is separate from all that we do love about our lives. We love our friends here, we love our family so very much. I (for the most part) love the schools - ok, maybe one of them I am really fed up with now and very much looking forward to summer break and strong hopes that they figure their shit out for next year when I have two kids there. I love my job and the flexibility it offers. I really like where I am, what I am doing, and I have a great group of people I am working with now and lots of opportunities available to me. I have even had a few recent opportunities to leave for 2 year appointments with other organizations.
Those are hard because AB also needs a job. And it is hard to embed oneself in a job that would be short term. We have talked more seriously about Vienna - that maybe we would go as a one job family. But the logistics start becoming heavy - dogs, kids, and the logistics of switching my work focus for that role. But it is tempting.
I have friends recently who are moving and I am finding myself a wee bit jealous. A woman I have only just started to know at work has announced she and her family are moving to Seattle for her husband’s new position - and that started me dreaming.
The other day AB mentioned that he is just about done with this area. Yeah. I get it.
I keep telling myself that if I was able to renovate the house to create my personal paradise whereby I would not be coming home everyday and feeling the weight of my dissatisfaction with our residence that maybe our issues would be solved. Maybe if I didn’t worry daily about what new things the neighbors are going to complain about? Maybe if I didn’t find this neighborhood and my house so stifling, it would be ok? I need to uninstall Zillow...
My list of places I would leave here to move permanently is quite small. You couldn’t pay me to go back to Colorado. Large cities make me claustrophobic. Traffic makes me nuts. I need beauty. I need the outdoors. I loved Reno, but the job situation there would be abysmal. I crave Alaska and so does my Alaska Boy. But that isn’t as simple either. We have never ever lived near family and only moderately tolerate having our family (that we love very much) visit us. How would we really do living in the same city as family?
For now, here we are. And we are committing to ourselves (in the absence of any extenuating circumstances, or fantastic opportunities) that we are here until Skadi graduates. At that point all bets are off. We are lucky in that our kids don’t seem to have a particular attachment here and if we mention moving they ask excitedly, when and where? I don’t have any notions of having this house for my kids to return to - and am more of the opinion that if I could rid myself of this place right now I probably would... but it requires too much work that needs to be put in - and I have zero time right now.
Ok, so I have put this post here. It is rambley and not terribly well organized. But out there.
My kids were born here, all delivered by a fabulous doctor, all attended a wonderful daycare (in the larger scheme), are working their way through teachers that, by in large, we adore and have enriched our kids’ lives. We have friends we can rely on and call on. We have food. We can travel nearly anywhere we may want to. I get my kids on the bus and can be home at the end of the day (most days) to watch them get off. AB has Friday’s off. Life is good. Just why can’t this place be the community we would love to love?
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