The Californians

I just remembered I have a blog. A blog that I have not touched in 18 months. Why? Well, we moved. To California. And I guess when you move to California you lose motivation to blog. Or maybe huge life changes leave little room for extras like writing about your life. Or maybe it's the high gas prices here. Anyway.

A lot of people ask me why we moved to California. It was just...time. We had sort of reached a crossroads in our lives. One option: Stay in Arizona with our comfortable jobs, maybe talk about starting a family (!), be wonderfully close to our families. Other option: Disrupt our lives mightily, spend a lot of money to move into a much smaller space, live six hours away from family. The choice was clear, right?

Actually, we needed a change. Both of our jobs, while comfortable, were at a plateau with no real potential for improvement. And while children are somewhere in our future, I knew that once we started down that path, pursuing a new career would be pretty tough.

So, childless and full of moxie, I began a job search. It took about eight months to get an offer, and another two to pack up, find a place in Long Beach and head west.

Moving to another state totally sucks. I had moved before, but just within a few ZIP codes. Renting a truck and fitting all/most of your possessions in one box is daunting. We pay for a storage space that does the job our garage used to do, and we share a two-bedroom apartment instead of a three-bedroom house.

And I love it. I. LOVE. IT. We can see the ocean from our balcony. We open the doors when we want to feel the cool ocean breeze. We go on weekend adventures to places with names like Malibu, Sonoma, Big Sur and Crystal Cove. We've been boating, parasailing, boogie-boarding and biking on the beach. We walk to concerts, festivals and restaurants. I'm in a job now that challenges me and teaches me new things all the time. T is pursuing a new and exciting career.

We upload incredible pictures on Facebook and talk about the unbelievable weather. Our Arizona friends and family find us insufferable.

While we miss our families, we do get back to the desert fairly often. I have a new appreciation for the giant Arizona sky, I miss the smell of rain and creosote, and I definitely miss the logical freeway design.

I don't know how long this chapter of our lives will last. It's certainly not perfect, but I don't regret it. Sometimes you just have to pack up your life and head to the beach.