Do I Change The Blog’s Name?

The Wife and I have done a lot of talking over the last week or so. We’ve decided that it’s just not happening for us in Tennessee the way we hoped it would — it’s not even working out halfway as well as it should for us to survive here in the long run. East Tennessee is too cliquish. You have to be in the club to get anywhere here, and we’re not in the club. Some people we’ve met who ought to be in the club aren’t doing a whole lot better than we are.

So that’s it. We’re going home. We’re aiming to be back in mid-June; July at the latest. It’s the high desert, which I once swore I’d never go back to, but damn it, it’s better than where I’m at now. There’s work there and I have a responsibility to provide for my family. No one here in Tennessee in a position to help me do that has done so; instead, both The Wife and I get treated like we have extra arms growing out of our foreheads. With some exceptions, native Tennesseans have treated us very poorly upon learning that we are from the Golden State, and pretty much only our money has been welcome here.

We broke the news to my folks, who are disappointed but supporting our decision. I’m disappointed for them; I know they were looking forward to living near us for once. But it’s not in the cards. We let my friend, who has the law firm where I will work, know that we were going to take him up on his offer. He’s thrilled, and so am I. It will be good to work with a close friend again; it will be good to work with laws and procedures that make sense; it will be good to have a full plate of work again.

The trip to Florida was sort of a reminder of what life was like. Florida was warm, comfortable, and relaxed. Fewer people put on airs and they cared less about their appearances than about their friends and family. California was like that. Tennesseeans have not proven to be that way — other than our fellow transplants. There, in Florida, we heard Spanish being spoken by people who did not see any reason at all to be self-conscious about speaking that language in public. There, in Florida, we ate fresh fruits and vegetables without a second thought as to what time of year it was. Even now, a gallon and a half of fresh Florida strawberries sit in our freezer, awaiting their ultimate fate (specifically, transformation into margaritas). In Florida, we were reminded that there doesn’t have to be a massive chunk of time spent every year shivering in the cold, wondering if the heating unit is ever going to work properly.

When we moved out here, we thought, “If we do ever have kids, we’d want to bring them up in a nice, safe place, and Tennessee offers much more of that than California.” We were wrong. Our kids would grow up less well-educated, and much more likely to be badly hurt in an auto accident here in Tennessee. The lack of diversity — and the lack of desire for diversity — made both of us question just what kind of people our kids would turn into if they grew up here. There’s physical danger, drugs, and bad role models everywhere, but in California, there is better health, more opportunities to provide good education, and a more diverse set of peers with whom our children could become acquainted.

It’s not just that California is what we know and are familiar with. It’s that the quality of life there is simply so much better than what we’ve found here. We’ll miss the friends we’ve made here, and we’ll miss my parents. We’ll miss the low cost of living and affordable housing. But getting a taste, even a tiny taste which was not the real thing by a long shot, was enough to remind me of what we’ve missed so much the past year and a half.

Trader Joe’s. Fresh fruit and vegetables, year-round. No asinine blue laws restricting when I can buy beer. Pulling over for ambulances, with living people who need help inside, insted of hearses, with people inside who are already dead. Identifying freeways with the definite article and the assigned number rather than references to a long-gone landmark. Finally making good on my promise to show The Wife around San Francisco. A system of laws and civil procedure that make sense, and a well-developed library of practice guides to explain things for when it doesn’t. Outlandish political figures, who propose ideas that no longer appear so outlandish, and who for the most part are substantially less corrupt. The great “In-N-Out versus Fatburger” debate. Wine sold in grocery stores. Golden poppies and ocean coastlines. Real skiing. Diving with sea lions in kelp forests.

California is where we belong. I can’t wait.