Chantilly, VA
Somerset, PA
Columbia, MO
Some of the places we've called home.
Copyright © 2018
by Ralph F. Couey
"This entire time I've been thinking about where my home was.
But in truth, home isn't necessarily where you sleep at night.
It's where you feel like yourself, where you're most comfortable.
Where you don't have to pretend.
Where you can just be you."
--Elizabeth Eulberg
Late in December 2016, we sold our home in Chantilly, Virginia in anticipation of my pending retirement the following month. Northern Virginia is an expensive place to live and I was concerned about continuing to make the mortgage payment. Plus, we had been considering for several years the possibility of Cheryl becoming a travel nurse. Essentially that means she would work a series of 13 week contracts as we hopped across the country. Part of the motivation was that we really didn't know where we wanted to plant our feet in retirement. Las Vegas had been our default choice for a while, but problems in the housing market along with rising rates of violent crime in Sin City pushed it to the less-than-desirable side of the list. By doing this contract work, we could visit various places and..."try them on for size," hoping that one would emerge as a good fit.
Now, fifteen months later, we still don't know where we want to live. Our daughter and her husband graciously allowed us to use their home in the 'burbs of Denver between jobs. Here, we have family, and we found a congregation that felt like home from the first day we walked through the doors. Central Colorado is a pretty place, and while the home prices are at the near tip of our affordability index, there are other considerations. We haven't adapted all that well to the altitude. Whenever we go to a doctor, we are told that our O2 sats are low and we are chronically dehydrated. It seems that for all this sky out here, there just isn't enough air in it for us.
Cheryl is on the verge of landing a sweet 4-year deal in Honolulu, which after all this time she still calls "home." Her mom has enthusiastically offered to let us stay with her, which is advantageous for both. While at 91 she is still charging at life like a wild bull, her memory has gotten to the point where she really needs someone to be with her at least part of the time. Plus, I have a line on two jobs that I could do. Neither pay very much, but coupled with my tiny little pension, it would be enough. But the job requires a background check by the government, and they never do anything quickly. In a way, we're kinda stuck because we don't want to be committed to another contract when this one could come through. That would carry us forward to the point when Cheryl was to retire (a complex calculation based on the maturation of several funding sources), and we hoped by then we would know where to settle.
Making that decision has proven much more difficult than we thought. Hawai'i is simply out of the question, unless a significant lottery prize presents itself. Ditto California, although we love the climate. Cheryl likes Pensacola, Florida for the sun, the beaches, and the apparent lack of sinkholes. But I can't stop thinking about hurricanes. I'd much rather read about one than live through it. We considered Kansas City as well. Weve both spent time there, since it's where I grew up and it's where she went to nursing school. We both have lots of friends in the area, and home prices are very reasonable. Even with all the moving around I've done, my sports loyalties (the Royals and the Chiefs) haven't shifted at all. Plus, we'd have the options ranging from the urban core to acreage in the country, neither of which are very far from each other. But, all other things being equal, the weather sucks. The summers are hot and humid, the winters cold, icy, snowy, and dreary. There's about three weeks in spring and fall when things are beautiful, but beyond that it's a climatological trial.
I'm still drawn to the west. Arizona has a multitude of charms, but those nasty 120-degree days in June and July definitely took the polish off that particular apple. Montana and Wyoming are affordable, but they have real winter up there and as we get older, our tolerance for those conditions is fading rapidly. New Mexico is not very friendly to retirees, and as far as Utah goes, we've smelled the Great Salt Lake in summer. Not doing that again. I like the hills and forests of south Missouri and the Shenandoah areas of Virginia. She wants to be near an ocean beach where she can sit and listen to the surf. I'd like that also, but affordability becomes a problem. The Pacific is way too expensive, and the Gulf and Atlantic have entirely too much weather-related excitement between June and November. Texas is affordable, but the summers there are just as bad as Missouri. There are places in the deep south that come close to filling the bill, but I have an Asian wife, and I don't think she'd be welcome there. A student of the Civil War, I looked closely at Chattanooga, Tennessee. Lovely town, killer scenery, and affordable houses. But as my bride pointed out, no ocean.
Are we being picky? To that charge I willingly plead guilty. But this will be the last home we ever have before that terrible moment when age dictates we can no longer live by ourselves, so we want it to be as perfect as possible. We joke about just getting a single-wide in Arkansas and letting it go at that, but in reality we both want more than just the basics. Some have suggested that we try a different country, but after twelve years of work in the counter-drug and counter-terror fields, I know too much about those places to feel safe.
This whole question came to an unexpected head as we returned from an Easter trip to spoil...er, visit...our grandkids in Maryland. As we were waiting at baggage claim, I said to Cheryl, "I'm getting to the point of when we come home, I want to be in our home, not intruding on someone else's." To my surprise, she agreed. So, Hawai'i or no Hawai'i, we're approaching our emotional waterloo and a time when a decision, come hell or high water, will be required.
There are criteria, absent the emotional baggage.
1. The climate has to be tolerable. Reasonable summers and mild winters. We'd like to avoid the threat of hurricanes, although we're okay with thunderstorms and tornadoes. Go figure.
2. Close to a major airport. There are nine grandkids who require regular and frequent spoiling. And we'd like to occasionally travel abroad, if we can afford it.
3. Good, if not great health care. While Cheryl's Okinawan heritage has gifted her great health, I have five stents in my heart, diabetes, a slightly leaky brain, and encroaching arthritis. Yeah. Rosy future, ain't it? Since I was unable to qualify for long-term care insurance, we'd need to be close to a VA facility where I could safely spend my declining days after my mind leaves this planet for good, as it most certainly will at some point.
4. Affordable housing in a place where we wouldn't feel compelled to avail ourselves of our second amendment rights.
5. A tax-friendly state for retirees.
Probably asking for way too much. However, these are the ideals, which admittedly are seldom connected in any way with reality. But hope is a powerful thing. And dreams do occasionally come true.
If not...well...there'll always be that single-wide in Arkansas.
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