Major update on my so called life. Back in December 2014, E and I were driving home from church. More like, we went to church, drove around for 45 minutes looking for parking, gave up and decided to go home, sad at yet another attempt to find parking near our church in Brooklyn. During our drive, E turned to me and said, "I think I'm ready to leave NYC." Gasp! I had been wanting to leave for quite a while although that desire had been waxing and waning for years. But in the more recent months, the need to figure out next steps in life made certain things very clear to me: 1) We did not want to live anywhere else but Brooklyn (and only certain areas of Brooklyn), Manhattan (again, only certain areas) and Queens (only I was open to the idea of heading back to Queens, and again, only certain areas). The idea of moving to Long Island or deeper into any of the outer boroughs to accommodate a family was just not something we were excited to do, 2) other than my sister and cousin, we really did not have family in NYC anymore, 3) a majority of the family we wanted to be near to were on the west coast, and 4) if we ever wanted to buy a home, we would get more for our money in anywhere but NYC.
Of course there were a billion other pros and cons. And the biggest problem was that we were both very much in love with NYC. And we had a very good situation going on...why mess things up? We both had pretty "easy" jobs given our professions, we had a large and amazing one bedroom apartment in a great neighborhood, with parking and very below market rent, we were close to all our friends...but we were in a constant state of "gray" - are we moving? are we not? do we lay down roots here? And to be frank, I was so over it. So off we went to visit Los Angeles in early March and while we were there, God must have blessed this decision because I went on 6 interviews at 3 different places, E went on 1, and within a few days after flying back to NYC, E had a job offer and I was still doing my next round of interviews. By week 2 since our return, I too had a job. Six weeks later, we were gone.
Now we are here in sunny CA. It's different, it will take some adjusting. The people are so much nicer here, but IMHO, they just do not have the hustle. I'm sick and tired of going to Target, buying a bunch of little things, and then having to gather everything into my arms because I forgot to bring my own bags. Or dealing with awful awful LA drivers who are completely absorbed in their own safety or their phones, and therefore become irresponsible and reckless drivers (can you tell how much I hate them?). But I love going to Trader Joe's on a Saturday afternoon and having no lines. Or people who say "hello" "how are you" "goodnight" just as you are walking by. And I love that most of my fruits and veggies come from the many farmers markets in the neighborhood. And I love that I get to work right across the street from the beach (albeit in business formal).
We are learning, adjusting, figuring things out. But regardless, I am so grateful that this move even happened at all, as smoothly as it did, and with both of us having jobs. God is good.
