Pros and cons of moving

[scottahill]

On Thursday we fly to Toledo, so that on Friday we can sign all the paperwork and buy our house. We didn't technically have to be there; the real reason I'm going is because I want to take another look at the house again-- not because we're going to back out, but because I don't remember the interior very well at all, and it was (ironically) one of the few houses that I didn't videotape on our house-hunting trip.

We're not actually moving until June. Packers are coming on June 1st (Jen's a big shot and gets a moving allowance-- yay!), and then the truck comes on June 2nd to load. It takes the truck at least 4 days to get to Toledo (union rules), so we're going to take four days to drive to Toledo in our '94 Ford Taurus (assuming it doesn't fall apart halfway there). Doing it in four days means we only drive 4 hours a day, which hopefully will be light enough to keep Miriam and Jen from going out of their minds.

As eager as I've been to escape Dallas, I'm starting to get nervous about Toledo: will I like the house? will it feel "big enough"? Will I like the neighborhood?

I thought a useful exercise would be to list the things I'll miss about Dallas, and separately, the reasons I'm looking forward to moving.


Things I'll Miss About Dallas/Irving

1. Our babysitter Dani. She's been with us for about a year now, and she's been very good with Miriam. I feel a little sad for Miriam-- I hope she isn't old enough to pine-- but I'm also going to miss my nine hours off a week, until we get a similar arrangement there in Toledo. In fact, Dani is going away for two weeks starting Friday, so I get a taste of that starting next week-- bleh.
   
2. The Recorder Society. Every 2nd Tuesday of the month for the past two years or so I've met with a handful of other people (4-8) to play recorder music. It's very relaxed-- there are no concerts, there's no "working through a section several times to get it right", we don't worry too much about tuning, and so I can just go once a month to play and not feel guilty that I haven't practiced enough, or frustrated/bored with repetition. While most of the people there are heavy into recorders and early music (most of them own a complete set of recorders, go to conferences, etc), they actually tell me that I'm a good soprano recorder player (i.e. I stay in tune because I have a good ear, which is essential with such a high instrument), and because it is actually hard work for me to play some of this music, their commendations mean so much more. (As compared to times when I sing in a church choir, where (pardon my immodesty) I could pretty much breeze through a solo and still get compliments. Singing at that level comes so easily for me that I don't feel like it's much of an accomplishment, and so the praise is actually embarrassing.)
   
3. The Open Window, a group of left-wing Catholics interested in church reform. I've been going to their monthly meetings for a couple of years now as well, and while I haven't been terribly active with them otherwise, I'll miss the people there (although there have been recent changes to their monthly prayer service which have annoyed me, and I appreciate being able to think, "don't sweat it, not your problem soon", etc).
   
4. The cul-de-sac in front of our house. Kind of a weird thing to miss, but we get very little traffic on the cul-de-sac, and so it mostly serves as a giant playground for Miriam, where she can push her carts and strollers on paved road (on a slant even, for a nice gravity effect). Yeah, it's not the safest thing to do, and it will be much better to let her play in our own fenced-in yard in Toledo, but I hope it won't feel too confining for her by comparison.
   
5. The carport. This is the first house we've lived in with a carport, and I appreciate it all the more every time it rains. Going from car to house without ever getting wet is wonderful, and it doesn't require one to bother with a garage door or anything.
   
6. The single-storyness. Mind you, a house doesn't seem like a house to me if it's only one story, but living in a ranch house has had its advantages. Miriam gets full run of the house; we don't have to worry about her going up or down stairs. Bringing laundry from bedroom to the washer and dryer is much easier.
   
7. The large bathroom with two sinks. (I don't remember our new bathroom at all; will it seem cramped?)
   
8. The skylights are kind of cool.
   
9. I miss snow now, but at the same time I will definitely miss not having to shovel it come January and/or February, whenever the novelty wears off.
   

Things I won't miss about Dallas

1. The heat. Already in May it's what I would consider summer weather; July-September are unbearable. I've become proud of my ability to handle the heat, but I've had enough. I miss northeastern summers, where heat waves actually break, and where one can enjoy the long twilit evenings outdoors.
   
2. The fire ants. When you step on a fire ant nest, they come swarming out, and if you stick around they bite you, repeatedly. Mind you, neither Miriam or I have been bitten, but at the cost of paranoia: I'm afraid to let Miriam play in our back yard, and reluctant to take her to the park, because of fire ants.
   
3. The giant cockroaches. Once it's dark out, I am always a little nervous about entering our kitchen.
   
4. The car-dependence. Our new neighborhood is not as car-friendly as Chicago or West Roxbury were, but it is conceivable that Jen could avoid driving to work most of the time (she might even bicycle to work), and there are also a number of stores not far from our house. We'll still need the car, but I'm hoping that walking/bicycling will be a more viable option more often.
   
5. The church situation. Probably too long a story for here, but I haven't found a Catholic church here that I really like. This might not have much to do with Dallas, and more to do with my finally having enough with the Vatican-- I've been going to an Episcopal church on some Sundays recently, and may make the jump-- but perhaps getting out of the South will help, or maybe just going somewhere with a different set of churches and priests.
   
6. The travelling and isolation. To go anywhere we want to go, we have to fly, and I hate flying and hate propping up the horrible airline industry. I don't think I'll be able to avoid all air travel in Toledo-- Jen hates long car trips and Miriam isn't too fond of them either-- but I'm hoping that at least some of the time we'll be able to drive to Pennsylvania, or even take Amtrak again. (C'mon, Joe Biden! High-speed rail in Ohio!) I'm hoping that being a long day's drive from my family means that we can visit more often, even if Jen stays behind to work. On the flip side, I'm also hoping that more people will come and visit us.
   

Things I'm looking forward to in Toledo

1. My basement office. The new house has a finished basement, and it's going to be my office. It's big, with plenty of place for pacing and for whiteboards on the walls, it will be far away from sleeping Miriam, and it will (hopefully) have better internet reception than my current office. I'm looking forward to putting a lot of effort into it and making it a refuge.
   
2. The neighborhood. Ottawa Hills is a small town surrounded by Toledo, and it is fiercely proud of its independence, and particularly of its schools. Our real estate agent, who also lives in Ottawa Hills, suggested that we should stop by the municipal building and introduce ourselves to the police and fire departments. I certainly get the feeling that it's a close-knit community, and while that could have drawbacks as well, it will be a nice change from most of our previous houses, where we knew few if any of our neighbors. (Irving has been an exception.)
   
3. The research environment. In Dallas there is no one working on complex networks, at all. In Toledo, I've already gotten in touch with an ecologist who studies food webs, and she is thrilled by the idea of having a theoretical physicist work with her. Not that she can pay me (that would be too much to ask), but she's going to help me apply for my own funding, and this will hopefully build up my research to the point where I can apply to liberal arts colleges without being embarrassed by my research record. There is also a bigshot network researcher in Ann Arbor (an hour away), and while he's already brushed off my attempts to get involved with his group, there still might be opportunities for collaboration there: if not with Mr. Big, then with his students. Or heck, even the occasional public seminar would be worth something.
   
4. The chance to renovate. As a renter, I get nervous about putting up too many pictures because of the nail marks. Although I've never been big on decorating or handiwork, I'm feeling the urge to do a little of both in the new home-- not just settling with what is, but changing it to make it better.
   
5. I am encouraged (though also socially anxious) by the fact that I've had two people at the University of Toledo promise to hook us up with the local social scene. I don't remember any similar outreach in Boston or Dallas, although I may have just ignored it, being shy.
   
6. Living in a city with a smaller ego. It's hard to love a place like Chicago or Dallas because they are already so in love with themselves. I'm more of a fan of underdogs, and Toledo seems to fit that bill for me. Although not quite as much of a punchline as Cleveland, it still seems like the sort of place people don't take seriously. It's Klinger's hometown! :) I hope that that sort of reputation may make it easier for me to fall in love with the place.