To break the news to our two daughters that we were moving to Blacksburg, Virginia, I concocted a scavenger hunt around our house in Austin that finally led them to a wall map. Next to the state of Virginia, a Post-It note said, “We’re moving.” Ella, then ten years old, looked at us with glistening eyes. “Really?” she said. Then … Read More
Does Everyone Hate Your City?
Here’s a startling truth: No matter how much you adore your city, there are people who hate it. Like, really can’t stand it. It’s strange, isn’t it, how two people who live in the same place can experience it in such vastly different ways? And yet 99% of the time, the city into whose soil you’ve dropped deep and happy … Read More
So You’re Thinking of Moving to Canada…
Trust me. I feel your pain. When you say that a Trump presidency will make you leave the country, I’m right there with you, pondering the fact that an entire branch of my family tree hails from Nova Scotia. That means Canada kind of has to take me in, right? We’re not alone in considering a move to the north. … Read More
Can friends make you love where you live?
In 2005, my sister Heather was basically living inside her own real-life version of Friends. She and my brother-in-law were renting a two-bedroom apartment in a complex in Tustin, California, where no fewer than eight of their best friends and relatives had also taken up residence. A band of super-social newlyweds, they were hanging out all the time. Squeezing into … Read More
Are people who move more creative?
Some amazing writers have been on the receiving end of a MacArthur Genius Grant: George Saunders, Sandra Cisneros, Karen Russell. (I’m still waiting for my own phone call.) Today, the MacArthur Foundation released a report explaining that among the 897 innovators and creatives to receive its $625,000 no-strings-attached grant are an exceptionally high number of movers. On average, 30 percent of Americans (and … Read More
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