Time to move?

May 22, 2023 3:12 AM

I have live in an inner-city neighborhood in a coastal state. There are many things I like about living here, but it's also subject to many of the issues that plague inner-city neighborhoods. I've never considered moving, but some things have changed and now I'm wondering if it's time.

I've lived in this neighborhood for almost 20 years. This is most of my adult life. It's the first place I've lived where I really felt at home. It's also got alot going for it. I hate driving, but that's not a problem since my neighborhood is centrally located and I can get just about anywhere I need to go by walking or taking public transit. It's diverse and there's a lot of great things (museums, restaurants, concert venues, cheap groceries, etc) in easy walking distance. I also live in a pretty specious apartment that has rent control. I know my neighbors and they know me.
However, if it was all sunshine and roses I suppose I wouln't be here. This is and always has been an inner-city neighborhood. There is a large unhoused population, and I've seen some pretty distrurbing examples of what a combination of unchecked capitalism, mental illness, and drug addiction can do to a person. There's the usual property crimes - mainly car break ins. These issues have recenly become significantly worse due to the pandemic, lack of city government action, and the increased availability of drugs like fentanyl.
All that being said, I've never really felt unsafe here even though I'm a small woman.
That all changed recently. I had two pretty scary incidents of men following me. One was a block away and he stopped when I told him to go away.
The next one just happened, and it was a doozy. A man who did not appear well (dirty closed, muttering to himself, etc.) started following me and trying to talk to me. I did not feel comfortable, so I got as far ahead as I could and got into my building as fast as possible. He followed me, but the gate closed and locked before he could get to me. My male neighbor happened to be home, saw what happened, and came out to yell at him.
That man continued to wait across the street for 20 minutes. I was going to go do my usual volunteer shift at the animal shelter near me, but I called to cancel because I don't feel safe leaving my apartment right now.
This has led me to wonder if it's time to move.
Here are the cons:
I am only able to live in this city because I have rent control. I don't make enough to rent at market rate in this city or really in any area near where I currently live, so moving would likely mean moving very far away.
I own a car but I hate driving. Moving to somewhere I can afford would likely mean I'd have to drive more.
I'd miss my friends and my neighbors. As an adult, it's hard to get established somewhere completely new, and I especially have a hard time networking and making friends due to social anxiety issues.
About a year and a half ago, I lost a loved one after a very intense illness. This has left me with a lot of trauma. Frankly, I'm just not sure I can handle the stress (not to mention the expense) of moving.
Here are the pros:
I work a remote job. Moving would not interfere with my employment at all.
As much as I love my neighborhood, I don't like the fact that it's getting to a point where I'm not really able to enjoy the things I like about it because of safety and expense.
The quality of life issues in my neighborhood (needles everywhere, human feces on the sidewalk, litter) do wear on me and I don't think they'll get resolved any time soon.
It's possible that I'll really love the place I hypothetically move to. When I moved here, I had no idea I would stay as long as I have, but I fell in love with the place. Whose to say that can't happen again?

I'm not sure what to do, and I would love to hear some other opinions.

posted by anonymous to Home & Garden (28 answers total)

From what you describe, it’s time to move. It may not be super urgent, but the arc of the situation is pretty clear. Sooner or later you will no longer feel safe where you are.

Once you accept that you’ll have to move someday I suspect you’ll want to go ahead and do it now. As you say, adult lives take a long time to build up and if you want to become a permanent member of a community the sooner you start the better.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 3:28 AM on May 22, 2023 [2 favorites]

Can you move to a different area in your city? I say that because I'm a recently widowed older woman in a dense urban area, and I went through all the considerations and decided to stay where I was for many of your reasons (transportation, access to things, diversity, neighbors). Neighborhoods can be different, at least in my city, from block to block. I wouldn't want to live two blocks away because it's objectively unsafe (stop&go liquor store, intersection of transit routes, occcasional shootings, drugs), but where I am, it's relatively cozy.

I have lived in the suburbs on and off half of my life and the city the other half, and the downside of the burbs is that you have all the tragedy but it's behind closed doors, plus you're cut off from all the cool stuff you can get to in the city. I've known too many people who got isolated in the suburbs. I periodically encounter people who fixate irrationally on me, sure, but I'd rather be where I knew my neighbors when that happens (recently when someone went off on me, I walked over to a neighbor's step and we stood talking while the guy realized I wasn't on my own and went away).
posted by Peach at 3:45 AM on May 22, 2023 [5 favorites]

You've given many reasons to stay where you are and only one reason to move: you don't feel safe anymore. Could you consider taking a personal safety course or doing a bit of therapy before you make the major decision to move? If you still feel unsafe afterwards then you could feel more confident that it's time for a change of location and throw your energy into making it work for you.
posted by guessthis at 4:08 AM on May 22, 2023 [19 favorites]

I had a similar incident happen to me in the (very wealthy and touristy) Historic District of Annapolis, only it was a clearly wealthy white guy who came out of a boaters' bar and chased me home and sat outside my apartment building. All that is to say, I'm really sorry this happened to you, but this shit happens to women (and people of other marginalized identities) everywhere, and moving to a "safer" neighborhood won't mean that shit like this won't happen. If you love where you live, don't let shitty incidents stop that.

I'm enjoying watching The Power and thinking about all the times I wish I could have shot lightning out of my hands.
posted by hydropsyche at 4:20 AM on May 22, 2023 [36 favorites]

Man, I feel like you should talk to your neighbors and see if they would like to for some kind of building watch/help program where you can take shifts or organize meeting a neighbor at the gate. I did this with a couple of neighbors in my old neighborhood when the lock was broken on our building and I regularly walked home a few blocks after midnight. They’d be watching out the window for me, I’d have called from the car. They’d have heard my panic alarm.
posted by pairofshades at 4:57 AM on May 22, 2023 [16 favorites]

I don't know if it's time to move for you vs. whether it's time to beef up your personal safety, work with your neighbors to build a community committed to keeping each other safe, and press your local government to authorize a needle exchange program and better local services for unhoused people. (Some of this might be the answer to some of your other issues, too - as a community with your neighbors, would it be helpful to have a twice-yearly litter clean-up you all do together, or can you work with your nearest needle exchange to see if they might be interested in doing a needle clean-up event they can publicize that can help your neighborhood, or help establish needle drop-off sites?)

I do think it's time to start devoting a bit of time to exploring whether you really are priced out of your city or whether there might be other neighborhoods you could afford and feel safer in. If you wait to explore that until it's time to move right now you're going to be desperate and rushed and have to rely on what's available right then, but is it possible that with some runway to just look around, you could wait and maybe catch a good deal somewhere at some point, or spend time to identify still-affordable neighborhoods?

Maybe not, maybe the whole city really just is out of reach now for anyone who's not rent-controlled. But it sounds like you love where you live enough that it would be worth devoting a bit of time and effort to a search now, when it's not an emergency.
posted by Stacey at 5:25 AM on May 22, 2023 [11 favorites]

I used to live in a similar place. After a number of disturbing incidents, including one of my neighbors getting shot in their driveway, I decided it was time to leave the city I had called home for so long. I moved across the country to a smaller city in the mountains. I do drive more, but feeling safe in my home and when I go out is worth it to me.
posted by ananci at 5:31 AM on May 22, 2023 [3 favorites]

I live in a situation so similar to yours that until you mentioned rent control I actually wondered if you lived near me. I've lived in my neighborhood for many years, it is very central, its problems have escalated because of state neglect coupled with overpolicing, there are a lot of unhoused people, I too have seen some not-great stuff, etc.

(I did also once have a mentally ill stranger punch me and chase me (not here, though) and it was extremely scary. It was hard to feel safe even behind a couple of locked doors for a while there.)

I would not move right now and I would not start planning to move in the wake of a traumatic event of this nature. The benefits to your location are so significant that a change is going to hit you much, much harder than you think now. And also, you can have a couple of upsetting events happen in a row and feel like they're always going to happen and then nothing happens again for years.

There have been times in the past few years that I've wished I could move because the noise and the human distress and the needles etc etc get wearing. On balance, I'm still toughing it out here - I hate driving, I chose this neighborhood because it was central, I'd end up moving somewhere much whiter while this neighborhood is multiracial, I'd have more expenses, etc.

For me, something that really helps is biking - I bike everywhere and thus I'm moving fast, and that not only makes me feel safer but makes me literally harder to hassle. Not everyone and not every city is really great for biking, but can you either bike sometimes or use one of those annoying little sidewalk scooters a bit? When you're on one you are physically bigger, you're harder to see in detail and you're moving fast, so it's harder for people to intercept you.

Also can you volunteer with a mutual aid project that assists unhoused people and/or people struggling with addiction? This is something I do, and I have noticed that while the situation in my neighhborhood still upsets me, it doesn't give me the same kind of stress because I've met a lot of unhoused people. I'd say that it has also given me more confidence in situations on the street both because it's been an education and because I'm in the habit of interacting with people. It changes how you feel walking around, and that changes your experience. Also, it removes the stress of many interactions, which lowers your overall stress, because you know unhoused people, you learn to see them as full people and in general unhoused people are victims and not perpetrators.

My feeling is that one or two scary incidents can leave you feeling far more unsafe than you actually are, and the feeling is real, and it's really stressful and bad. I'm not saying that there is never a point where you'd decide to leave, but in my opinion it is worth trying to situate what has happened to you - how likely is it to happen again, can you minimize your risk, etc.
posted by Frowner at 5:38 AM on May 22, 2023 [38 favorites]

It's always easy to think of reasons to move away from where you are - nowhere's perfect after all - but where would you go instead? Would the safer environment you're hoping for be worth losing all the things you love about city life? Until you've got clear answer to those questions, I'd stay put.
posted by Paul Slade at 5:55 AM on May 22, 2023 [1 favorite]

I just had to give my 10 year old “the talk” about what to do if he hears gunfire. It’s not fun not to be able to walk freely. You’ll get used to a new place if that’s what you decide to do. Humans adapt. You could consider living with roommates in a more expensive city or neighborhood.
posted by haptic_avenger at 5:58 AM on May 22, 2023

You're in a pretty enviable position. Because of your job you can move anywhere, at any time. But you don't have to move. You live in a place you basically like and can afford. So you can consider your options and make up your mind at your leisure.

If I were you, I'd start doing some research and thinking about where you could move if you were going to move. See if you start getting excited about the possibilities. And then once you've identified a place you think could work, go check it out. I'd rent a VRBO or Airbnb and live there for a month. If even the best option you can come up with seems like it would be worse than where you live now and you're filled with dread at the thought of packing up and moving there, I would still go live there for a month, just to confirm that it really wouldn't be better.

Chariot pulled by cassowaries makes a good point about the relative risk from cars vs. other people. The scariest incident you've faced didn't involve physical contact or an explicit threat or even any clear indication the person would have tried to do more than talk to you. You're probably not in any great danger where you are. On the other hand, there are many places you could live where the quality of life issues you mention barely exist at all. And new experiences are so life enriching that when faced with a choice between doing something new and sticking with the status quo, I think it's almost always a good idea to lean towards the new thing. Why not at least start considering some new possibilities?
posted by Redstart at 6:02 AM on May 22, 2023 [3 favorites]

Based on your description, I'd start by brainstorming things that might make me feel safer. Joining or starting community groups? Forming a street cleanup team (assuming your city can't be hassled enough to take care of that)? Researching or taking courses in personal safety? Those things take time and money and energy, but maybe less than moving and driving.

And also start considering where you could move that might bring you joy. Walkable small towns, "nicer" neighborhoods in less expensive cities, places where you might have some family or friend connections, etc. Comparing your current situation to other specific options, rather than vague "somewhere else," may make your decision clearer.
posted by metasarah at 6:11 AM on May 22, 2023 [2 favorites]

Only you know what is most important to you, but I would move because my safety and sense of safety are my highest priority. I live in a big city with many of the issues you describe and the prevalence of issues like outdoor drug use, street confrontations, violent crime, etc. change from neighborhood to neighborhood, and sometimes by street. I know how to navigate areas to avoid likely problems and thankfully, I don't usually have much to navigate on my street. But, it is tiring. If I felt more directly threatened, I would move without hesitation.
And just in case it is a factor, don't feel any guilt about moving. When your quality of life and lifestyle are suffering, it doesn't matter how great a city is on paper, and you sticking around isn't going to change it.
posted by fies at 6:46 AM on May 22, 2023

Problem: You want to feel safer, and more importantly, you want to be safe.

Solution 1: Move. Probability of success: not 100%, better than 50%

Solution 2: Talk to neighbors and consider neighborhood watch. Probability of success: worth researching

Solution 3: Increase personal security through training, accessories, timing, or potentially human or animal companionship. Probability of success: not known

Solution 4: Increase building/apartment security with locks, security systems, etc., or even inviting gentrification. Probability of success: not known.

Solution 5: Research similar problems and solutions that worked. Each of those becomes an additional potential solution.
posted by amtho at 6:54 AM on May 22, 2023 [1 favorite]

I would ask myself one question: If I did not live there now, would I move there. If the answer is "no", move if "yes" stay.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 6:57 AM on May 22, 2023 [16 favorites]

Whether you move or not, it doesn't have to be right this minute.

I think I'd start thinking about and researching your options in terms of a move, not necessarily in order to do it but in order to figure out what's possible and what it would look like. Think outside the usual suspects - there are a lot of places where it's possible to live mostly or entirely without a car, including specific areas or even streets in cities or towns where most people do drive, and not all of them are super expensive. Thinking about possibilities at your leisure can help you figure out what's actually doable, what you care about, and what doing it would take.

And at the same time I'd try to think about safety measures for the current location, like the ones described above.

Some extra things to consider: Where do your local friends live? Is living in a different part of your current area with a roommate an option? If you stay in your city, is it a place you see as continuing to be accessible as you age?
posted by trig at 7:13 AM on May 22, 2023 [1 favorite]

If you're thinking about moving, I'd suggest researching some places that you're interested in, including average rents, and then making a visit that includes neighborhoods that you can afford. Doesn't have to be a long visit, maybe a weekend. Do you feel safe? Is there anything there of interest to you? Can you see yourself living there?

If that sounds completely unappealing or you don't have the money to do those basics, then the decision is made for you--stay where you are. (The money part sounds harsh, but moving blind means you run the risk of landing in another unsafe situation without the help of having friends and neighbors.) If it sounds interesting and you're financially in a position to do it, there's no harm in looking.
posted by kingdead at 7:13 AM on May 22, 2023 [2 favorites]

Sounds like this scary event just happened. I’m sorry that happened to you. Maybe you should move, maybe you shouldn’t, but were you actively wondering that before this event happened? If not, I would table the question for a pretty long while.
posted by daisyace at 7:22 AM on May 22, 2023 [9 favorites]

> I would ask myself one question: If I did not live there now, would I move there. If the answer is "no", move if "yes" stay.

Yup - the reversal test is pretty powerful and has helped me navigate some bad living situations (e.g. it'll cost me $200 in fees to change my contract to leave my current place. Would I accept $200 in exchange for moving into said place if I didn't already live there? In my case, the answer was hell no).
posted by osmond_nash at 7:22 AM on May 22, 2023 [8 favorites]

Another way of framing the two events that happened to you is that you were placed in situations that put you on high alert, and you successfully navigated out of them into safety. Besides feeling scared, no harm came to you. I say this as a woman who has been followed many a time, so I appreciate it is an adrenaline rush - but most of the time these types of incidents do resolve like your two experiences - you told the first guy off and he listened, you placed distance between yourself and the second guy and got to safety and a neighbor supported you (store owners will also generally be willing to help). I also agree with Frowner - being a bike makes one a harder target.

As someone who has moved a lot in my 30s and is now regretting a bit the social cost of this, I urge you to not discount your deep friend network. It is much harder to make friends in your 30s than 20s - not impossible, but notably harder.

If you rent is a real deal, you could see if anyone in your extended network would be up for an apartment swap for a month. Perhaps someone who is a friend of a friend would be curious to try living in your city, just like you'd be curious about their city. If not, you could just take a month-long working vacation in whatever city you imagine you might like, and then see what the reality of a month there is actually like. But I wouldn't immediately give up what you've built in your current home.
posted by coffeecat at 8:01 AM on May 22, 2023 [9 favorites]

I don't know if it's time for you to move but i will tell you that when i moved from the "inner city" -- where I was punched in the face by a mentally ill person , mugged three times including once knocked over and sat on, and chased by someone in broad daylight in a park -- to a different kind of "safer" city with single family houses, I felt MUCH less safe in the new place. Why? Because when I was chased in the urban park I screamed and people ran over to see what was happening, people were passing by while i was mugged so the muggers were quick about leaving, and I always felt like I could walk around at night and at least people would be there to provide some kind of accountability or witnessing so that might mitigate random violence. In the new town, walking to my car in a parking lot at night is terrifying because no one is around. It literally feels like a scary movie when I hear my footsteps in the empty parking lot. The break-ins to houses including violent home invasions, which do happen, are more scary to me than a random mentally ill person following me and talking to me in an aggressive way in the street. PLUS there are still a lot of problems downtown here with unhoused folks congregating so it still feels like the same stuff you describe from the city happens here too. It took me a long time to be able to sleep alone in a single family house without thinking I heard someone every time a board creaked. I don't like walking in empty streets. Of course, I moved for other reasons than seeking safety, and I didn't ever feel unsafe generally even after all those incidents in the city so maybe you will feel safer in the kind of place I moved to.
posted by rainy day girl at 8:07 AM on May 22, 2023 [11 favorites]

First, I'm sorry this happened to you. While I get irritable at people who exaggerate the dangers of city living, if you happen to be unlucky and do experience someone's aggression, it is legitimately frightening and unsettling. Don't hesitate to do whatever you ordinarily do post-trauma to soothe yourself.

That said, I would not decide to uproot my life in what sounds like the immediate wake of a frightening incident, especially since it sounds like otherwise your life works very well for you in the city. Give yourself some time to let your feelings settle. Once you have, do some research to see whether there are genuinely desirable options in your price range. In other words, think of this as an opportunity to rethink some of your assumptions about life (which do settle as we get older) and consider whether some other situation would suit you better. But it needs to be a move to something positive in a different way, not a flight from fear.

Finally, echoing what rainy day girl said--I find myself anxious in quiet suburban settings at night because of the emptiness. Since you would have to be reestablishing yourself socially and don't seem to have kids, you'll be looking to go out a lot more in the evenings and coming home in the quiet. The inner ring of suburbs of many cities have experienced significant demographic shifts as the price of downtown living has shot up. Don't think moving out of the city invariably means escaping poverty and its unfortunate side effects. It may not be as visible in an inner suburb, but it is still there, and that means the kinds of crime associated with poverty (far from the only kinds, but the ones you may tend to feel most on a day-to-day basis) will be, too.
posted by praemunire at 8:35 AM on May 22, 2023 [15 favorites]

I am sorry those two incidents happened to you and that you feel unsafe in your neighborhood. In your position I'd feel pretty unsettled by it, too. It's not fair to people on any side of that equation that the political and development class in this country have created this situation and tolerate it out of mutual convenience or whatever.

I live in Los Angeles, so my city is basically your city--the wealth disparity is crazy, the prevalence of unhoused people left to just sort of deal on their own terms is staggering, the stepping over needles and shit, the sense that your once-great neighborhood is now too expensive and is sort of dying culturally, the rent control being the only thing that is keeping you from having to move literally to another state. It is an unsettling state of affairs. (For folks who don't live in cities with rent control: in most cases the rent goes to market rate when a unit is vacated, so leaving your apartment for one in the same city basically destroys your quality of life--my rent would go up $1,500 overnight if I were to move, for example.)

You had two scary experiences where you had legitimate cause for concern. People have given a lot of good thoughts on organizing your immediate community of neighbors for more secure entry and exit, getting politically involved, and getting involved in mutual aid. I think that what I'd emphasize in addition is just the stability and security of having what you've stated you have: a community of friends and neighbors that you have built through your own effort over much time. These things are invaluable and they do contribute to our physical, mental, and emotional well-being in ways that are difficult to measure and even more difficult to replace. So it's worth thinking about whether leaving all that behind would leave you more secure in a holistic sense. Maybe your sense is there is a threat to your physical well being that is acute enough to outweigh that. But it's just definitely a primary thing I think you should consider.

Also I hate to sound like a cold actuary about this, but if your choice is between more driving and less driving, this is probably going to be statistically your highest stakes decision about long term safety and health.
posted by kensington314 at 11:59 AM on May 22, 2023 [5 favorites]

Oh boy, that all sounds scary. And it sounds like it happened just now? I agree with folks who say that you don't have to make a decision immediately. It's also okay to take some time and deep breaths and reflect on the bigger picture situation.

You have a lot that you love and value in your current situation. And, yes, our cities are changing. There are more folks struggling and suffering. I have lived in my in-town neighborhood in a coastal city for about 14 years, and I have started shifting some of my own behaviors. For example, I used to be game to walk or at least bike in most neighborhoods most of the time; now there are some areas I generally avoid, especially at night.

So I want to encourage you to think about that. I agree that talking to neighbors about your neighborhood and safety is a great idea. I wonder if you could think about having a neighbor walk with you when you leave, or someone to check in with when you are walking home, if only in the short term. Even knowing someone knows when you're coming and going can be helpful.

I say this in part because suburban areas can have their own dangers, from the isolation, and also from all the driving. Lots of driving can really be soul-crushing.
posted by bluedaisy at 2:14 PM on May 22, 2023

I live in a smaller city in a not-coastal state (red, so no rent control per se). As not-major as my city is, we see a lot of the same problems you describe. Plenty of property crime (car prowls are a specialty!), more violent crime than local leadership wants to acknowledge, gross stuff on the ground, sidewalks and road crossings that are not really “safe” for a number of reasons (including reckless drivers from the sticks who are more or less agnostic to pedestrians).

My place is walking distance to all sorts of businesses, as well as various transit modes, but I assume every time I leave my house I’ll witness at least one person having an obvious psychotic break. (I know I will pass a homeless encampment if I go more than a block or two in any direction, but this is not a direct correlation to my probability of getting hassled.) I try to remember that the person is unwell and it isn’t about me, but thanks to certain Adverse Childhood Experiences it will always be unnerving. Overall, I try to give people a wide berth when they’re screaming. I cross streets out of my way, etc.

Before I turned 40, it was also highly likely I’d get hassled by creepy men (of nearly any socioeconomic status). It still happens, but not with the same frequency as when I was younger. (My state has a lousy track record for women generally, which I believe contributes to both the mistreatment of younger women and the invisibility of older ones.)

All this is to say, vet any prospective new hometown/neighborhood with care. Less-sophisticated places, for all their relative car dependency, can have the same problems as major cities, but less of the resources to address those problems. I’ve felt safer in some major cities at midnight than I have in this one at noon.

It may feel empowering to read up on personal safety and self defense. I personally find it empowering to keep going out on walks/runs, figure out which routes are less problematic, and build my little mental database of behavioral red flags. (Examples: that person is walking like they have a weapon in their cargo pocket; that person is screaming at nobody in particular; that guy sees me approaching on the sidewalk but he’s acting like he won’t step out of my path. Can I divert my course?)

Like you, I plan to move when I can; I encourage anyone to assume that, anywhere in the States, these problems will exist to some degree. I try to look at my current city as a training ground for something a little better.

I’m sorry you’re dealing with this, and I hope you can find a place where the cost-benefit analysis makes sense to you.
posted by armeowda at 2:50 PM on May 22, 2023

Oh, my friend. I feel this so hard.

I'm a cis man so there is different context to you, but I'm also a pretty small (and not-White) boy who has always lived in cities and has been assaulted in public on multiple occasions. My husband and I now own a home in one of the most depressed and traumatized neighborhoods in one of the most depressed and traumatized cities in the country (New Orleans) and yet I wouldn't trade the needles in my front yard for a leafy suburb with no sidewalks for... well, I suppose if you paid me enough money I'd consider buying my own car. Maybe.

My advice to you is to do what I did when I came out to myself, fifteen years ago -- make a provisional decision. I told my young, evangelical-raised self: I'm going to decide that I'm gay for a few weeks or so, I don't have to talk about it with anyone, it's between me and the Holy Spirit... and I'll just see how it feels. Once I put it on, I knew within a day that it's who I am. It felt right.

So tell yourself, "I'm going to move." Put it on and see how it feels, and I think you'll know soon enough whether it is the right thing to do for you.
posted by tivalasvegas at 2:53 PM on May 22, 2023 [4 favorites]

I think rent control trumps everything. It is so rare and so important. I’d exchange almost anything for that. Also, with things the way they are, you could eventually end up forced into a similar neighborhood because of housing expenses, but without rent control. I’m in that sort of situation, and I’d love to have made different choices.
posted by asimplemouse at 2:55 PM on May 22, 2023 [6 favorites]

About two and a half years ago, I moved very far away from a city I called home for longer than I have any other place in my adult life. I think there's a chance we're talking about the same city (and even if we aren't, we have a common vocabulary). It was the first place I ever owned a home. I arrived after many, many years feeling like a pilgrim, wandering here and there, always moving to find cheaper rent, never quite feeling at home. Then I got into a relatiosnhip and we aimed for this city. For years it was our motivation. And we made it! It took six long years, but we made it, settled in, and I loved it. It felt like home. But, after that relationship ended, I spent two years struggling with the thought of staying or leaving. It was so expensive that I knew I had to sell my home, and looking for a rental broke my heart. It was impossible to stay, genuinely. So I left.

There have been things that I miss, but... I do not regret leaving. I also do not regret moving far instead of moving a relatively short distance away. The distance has, I think, helped me see my former home with clearer eyes. I didn't fully grasp how much of my mental energy was dedicated to defending the place, to others as much as to myself, especially regarding the homelessness and lack of public toilets and needles and fentanyl and to cost and the bitterly intrasigent local politics and, and, and...

The trouble was, I didn't know where to go next. I considered so many options. Some felt compelling in their own right, some felt particularly responsible or considered, some felt risky with the promise of adventure. I oped for the latter. Was it the right choice? Yes. Indeed. Is it a permanent choice? No, I don't think so. But I did find that everything I had in my former home can be had where I am now, and without so many of the peccadillos (and downright bad things) I'd grown accustomed to in that fair coastal city. From my background, I'd say to myself that the fact of wondering about moving was a sure sign that it was time to move. The fact that my work is very adaptable to remote routines was a comfort that I could change my address without changing everything. The fact that my heart was open to the possibility of loving somewhere else was an invitation to get out and see how that might take shape.

Whatever you choose, I wish you the best of luck (and continued strength while you are where you are).
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 1:36 AM on May 23, 2023 [1 favorite]