Six months ago, we left our apartment for the very last time. The apartment we brought our babies home to. The apartment we spent 5 years in – the longest I’ve ever spent in one home in my entire life.
So, how’s it going?
Mostly, okay. The move is better than I expected, to be honest. I expected it to be horrible, though. Someone told me the first six months after moving are the hardest, so I braced myself for that.
(It still feels temporary, so maybe part of it feeling okay is because I just assume this isn’t forever. Not the healthiest mindset, perhaps. Coping skills!)
The Hard Stuff
We miss people. Even though technology is great and we can keep in touch better than ever – it’s still not the same as getting to see our friends and family on a weekly basis. Luckily, those people are wonderful and put in the time to visit us! (And we visit them, of course)
It’s expensive. I’ve probably talked this to death, but we are paying double what we were in Ohio on housing. DOUBLE. It’s killing me to write the check every month (and not just because I miss auto-payments, heh). Though rents are high, home prices are also higher here. So purchasing wouldn’t solve all our problems. (And we need even more than we saved for a downpayment because of said prices!) Heavy sigh. At the end we had the chance of working with Movers NYC who made it very affordable for us.
Lack of diversity & walkability. It’s incredibly segregated here. I want my kids to grow up in a neighborhood and city where there are a variety of skin colors and ethnicities. It’s really important to me, raising two little white males, that they grow up comfortable with diversity. Unrelated, but also important to me, walkability isn’t really valued here – sidewalks aren’t everywhere (or they are only on one side of the street??), the pedestrian walk signs on busy streets make you wait like 10 minutes, and it’s just generally really car-centric. Diverse, walkable, affordable – that’s my wish list. We’re 0/3 in our current neighborhood.
Aside from moving away from our support system and the familiar, moving to an entirely different part of the country – from the midwest to New England (or maybe it’s just called the northeast? labels confuse me) has been an adjustment of its own. At the risk of offending people I really adore from this part of the country, it just feels a little more…elitist? than what I’m used to. People seem to care more about stuff like what school your kid goes to than they do where I’m from. Maybe it’s the proximity to more Ivy Leagues here? It’s definitely A Bigger Thing here to care about. (Or maybe we’ve just stumbled across more wealthy circles than I’m used to!)
The Good Stuff
Mike’s job. Aka: the reason we moved so far away. His job is much more flexible, so even though we are far from family, I don’t feel an undue child care burden because he’s able to be much more present than he was last year. I love it.
We have friends…or at least people to sometimes hang out with. We have a few people we’ve gotten together with a few times. I tried joining a moms club, which turned out to just be one person. We became friendly, though, and see each other about once a week. I have a few other acquaintances with kids Theo’s age, as well. We don’t have a huge social circle or best friends – but it’s only been six months. If we are still close friend-less in a year or two, I’ll be sad, however.
Our kids are happy. They are young and flexible, so I didn’t expect them to have a terrible time with the move. But the fact that they are really thriving, Gabe especially, comforts me. (I do wonder if I should enroll Gabe in more activities, but you know, that’s totally unrelated to moving and more just general mom guilt and worries.)
Change is an adventure that I embrace. I never wanted to be someone who never ventured outside the comfortable, possibly because of my childhood, we were always on the move, constantly. This is certainly an adventure! We enjoy exploring the towns and cities around here.
It’s not that big of a deal. Most of all, this is what it really boils down to for me. This isn’t a big burden to bear – people move, people leave their families, it happens. We are driving distance away, so it’s not terrible.
Looking forward to a few more adventures that are within driving distance this summer – Montreal? Maine? And definitely NYC!
I love western Mass for what it is, but… well, yes, a lot of the stuff you’ve mentioned about the snobbery and the segregation is very much in line with the East Coast in general and New England in particular. Living in Denver now, I don’t think I could ever go back to being an East Coaster. On the walkability piece, I do think part of the issue is just that the towns are old and were not intentionally designed for things like sidewalks the way some newer cities and neighborhoods are.
Also, six months in and you already have a handful of local friends–I’m impressed! It took us a few years to really settle into local friendships here, and honestly, the biggest help was Callum starting school–we got to know the other parents and that made a big difference. Hopefully that will be the same for you!
Mike’s work has a lot of transplants, too, which helps!
Oddly, where we lived in Ohio, it was the opposite – new suburbs were very car-centric while older suburbs were super walkable with 100% sidewalks! And now, I think developers realize that, yes, cars are helpful, but people still need to walk their dogs and go for walks – so sidewalks are back in. It’s generally a little less densely populated here than where we lived, though, so that probably contributes it, too!
I’m born and raised on the East Coast and I loathe most parts of Massachussetts – so I totally get it! It was also weird moving from Queens NY where everyone walks/can walk anywhere to first the Bronx with limited walkability, and then to Long Island where no one walks.
But if you come to NY I hope we can get together!
It totally makes a difference if there’s a culture of walkability – if other people are out and about, it feels normal. I miss that!
It depends where you go in terms of walk ability. I’m 25-30min outside Boston and there are a lot of suburbs with a walkable downtown. But even those tend to be a handful of streets and they are hard to get into (aka competitive to buy the houses)
Also New England = mass, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont. “The northeast” adds New York in. Don’t know why, but that’s the fact.
Yes, that’s exactly it – there are FEW walkable areas but just a few streets and the houses around there are more expensive and come on the market less! Don’t developers realize people wanna live in areas like that??
Also, good to know, re: northeast vs New England! I noticed New York wasn’t part of the Big E and my friend from New York refers to this whole area as the northeast. Makes sense now! I’m learning more and more.
I miss walkability. Going from Chicago to small city Indiana, ugh. People think I’m crazy because I walk a mile from my apartment to my classes on campus. That’s how far I walked to get to my preferred (cheaper) grocery store. And I hear you on sidewalks. Either nonexistent or maybe on one side of the road. So, yes, I walk on the shoulder of the road (on the correct side, which 98% of the people in this town don’t understand!)… We have a city bus, which is free for me as a student, but the hours are ridiculous! You can’t really go anywhere after 6-7pm on weekdays, 3pm on Saturdays, and at any time on Sundays. It takes just as long (or sometimes quicker) for me to walk to campus as it would to take the bus (mainly because I have to go downtown and transfer at the hub just to get to campus).
Also. I really miss good restaurants. I mean, I’m just happy (ecstatic really) that we have an amazing Chinese place. Growing up here, the only “Mexican” we had was Taco Bell & Taco Grande. So it’s come a long way. In in terms of delivery? I have about 12 places that will deliver to my apartment — maybe 7 of which are pizza places. It, too, was a culture shock from the 250+ I had in Chicago.
Anyway, glad to hear that you are mostly adjusting otherwise!!
It’s SO true – a culture of walkability makes a big difference! One mile is not that far to walk, but in a place where people don’t think about walking anywhere, it makes you feel like an alien!
Hi! I’ve followed your blog for several years but have never left a comment (lame, I know). We live south of you in Connecticut and even though I was born and raised here, I can understand your feelings toward the Northeastern “attitude”. Still, there are also brilliant, kind people here and I sure hope you find them. Too bad we aren’t just a tiny bit closer. I think we would be friends! Hang in there. – Cary
We love Connecticut because it has our closest Target and Ikea. ;) I definitely don’t think everyone is snobby and have encountered lots of lovely people! :)
I moved to the suburbs…SUBURBY suburbs, and I hate it. Firstly, no one walks here because it’s 90+ degrees for 9-10 months of the year (literally, yesterday was 92. Kill me!), people don’t even walk to their mailboxes sometimes because even 300 yards in 120 degree heat will probably give you heatstroke.
There is no walkability, no trees, and–for me–no real sense of community. It suuuuucks.
xox
Uggggh that is hard. All around. We stay with my parents in the suburby suburbs for a few weeks at a time and I always feel really isolated and trapped because I can’t walk anywhere and there are no sidewalks to even safely walk around the neighborhood without having to be vigilant for speeding cars. I don’t want to have to get in my car to go EVERYWHERE, you know?
Also, we lived on the equator where it was 91 degrees year round and that is TOUGH. We adjusted quickly, but I never really figured how to go running outside without dying, ha.
I’ve moved from Brazil to Toronto when I was 23 and after that to Ottawa where I live now. Moving is always an adventure! One thing that really helps is to find a Church, specially with young families where there are activities for kids, I always feel welcomed and meet the most interesting variety of people (from all over the word, but then again, Ottawa). Good luck in finding a new place to love!
Brazil to Toronto!? Wow, that is a big move!
I’ve lived in eastern/central MA since I moved out here for college and people definitely are way snobby and elitist about towns and local schools and colleges and everything. I live closer to Boston and anyplace with a nice walkable town center is super pricey. We made some trade offs when we bought our house to stay close to my husbands work but I had to give up on my dream of living in the town center because we were just not going to find a house we loved there. In the end we absolutely adore our neighborhood and my husband is only two miles from his work so it worked out, but the decision making process was tough. Good luck, deciding where to live in a new area is tough.
I’m so glad you ended up liking where you live! We made a similar decision moving here – just 2-3 miles from my husband’s job, but we don’t love our neighborhood. We figured we’d get to know the area this year and then move to a better area in the fall. But we’re learning there aren’t really any better areas that are close enough!
Elitist is correct. I’m a transplant to WI from CT and I don’t think I could ever go back, for all the reasons you list missing from Ohio and finding difficult in Mass. – it’s hard work to break through that east coast worldview. Take heart, You can make a niche and change the people you find in it, and there ARE people who feel the same way you do, it might just take a little longer to sift through the elitist attitudes out and make some real friends. For now, enjoy being able to go for weekends at the beach in the summer. That’s pretty much the top of the things I miss! Good luck.
I’m glad things are at least going better than expected :) I was definitely nervous for you. I think the exact attitude you are referring to is why a lot of people who move to MA don’t like it. I used to complain about people being snobby when I was younger and my mom would say “oh Kelly, there are snobby people everywhere” and while that is true, I think we have more of it than some places. Though I have managed to find even more snobby people in another area but I won’t call that state out on your blog, lol.
I’ve never really be to the TRUE midwest (only Chicago, which hardly counts because it’s a big city) but whenever I’m in the south I’m always shocked at how nice people are. I also think this overall attitude is more influential when you are getting to know a new area/community and once you have friends who aren’t like that, it’s less of a big deal. Hopefully you will find that!
I really like my neighborhood because it’s a great sense of community and it is walkable without being close to the downtown (it’s a little over 2 miles to the downtown so I bike there and probably COULD walk, but I don’t think I ever have, ha). I mean don’t get me wrong, I’d love to live downtown but I could never afford it ha ha. Luckily, I live less than a mile from a little village (it’s not the main downtown) of the town next to me. I can walk to Starbucks, Trader Joes, Walgreens, a delicious cookie bakery and a few restaurants and some other things. The only problem is the massive hill I live on which makes it a bit more of a production to actually walk to these things, but I do it sometimes :) I always tell Eric I want to live somewhere more walkable, but compared to where I grew up, this is a pretty big step up!
I know I’ve probably said this before, but it’s been so fun to see all of the things you have explored and done with your family since you moved!
One more thing… we do a LOT of walking in our neighborhood, almost nightly. We do a maze route (sorta) to stay on side walks or on roads that don’t need them at all. Our route ends at a park. If you could find a neighborhood like that, at least you’d get your walking in!