Letters to the Editor
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East or West
Live where your soul can breathe.
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Look inside to find HOME
I think that the LW is running away from her problems and uncertainty, and hoping to run to a place that can be very difficult to live in.
I am from CA and my family moved to the Midwest when I was in middle school. Some people couldn't understand why, but the locals knew that they lived in a good place, so moving there wasn't that crazy.
Now I'm going to school on the East coast, which I knew would never be the place for me, and indeed it is not. I had longed so badly to move back West for school, but fate had planned otherwise.
I visit "The West" nearly every year to go camping and visiting with extended family. I love it so dearly and those times are beyond special to me. However, when I look at what CA has become, I don't think I could ever live there again. The median home price in the town I was born in surpassed $1M almost 5 years ago. That type of thing, combined with the congestion, population density, pollution, general high cost of living, the strained attempt to seem laid-back, and the insane amount of work it takes to maintain even a basic lifestyle, convince me that I will never move back.
Meanwhile, I have finally, finally fallen in love with the Midwest. It helps that I fell in love with a midwesterner, too ;) And you know what I have learned after all this moving: the place you live in doesn't necessarily make you happy. You have to be ready to be happy, be ready to put down roots and love a place for all its lumps and bumps. Furthermore, some places are better to visit than to live in (I definitely put CA in that category). Live in a place that nurtures and supports you, and travel to beautiful, stunning locales.
I see some people around me who move constantly, seeking that hipper, more progressive, more cosmopolitan, more beautiful place. I don't think they every find it, and every time they seem like they're going to call some place "home", they decide there's something better to be had, and they pull up and move. Is this going to be you?
Is "The West" simply a romantic and beautiful ideal to you that could easily be crushed by the grind of reality? Or is it truly where you would want to put down roots, even if it's where the people don't talk or vote like you? If it's the former, stay home. As many have said, you can find all of the physical things you said you were looking for in the East. But if it's the latter, then perhaps a move is due. However, do not believe for a second that moving will solve any other problems than sating your desire for fresh fruit and hot sunlight.
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Didion already did this, Cary.
Does no one do their homework anymore?:
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~zkurmus/html/didion.html
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Think again; explore your own backyard
I can only add my voice to those who say that if you think that the East Coast doesn't have trees I cannot imagine where you've been on the East Coast. Huge swaths of the East Coast are densely wooded. Issues of light are more subjective, but just last weekend I was drinking in a lovely view of mist-soaked woods in coastal Connecticut, which appeared as islands in the retreating fog, as the sun chased away the remnants of a summer downpour. This was on the I-95 while I was on the super-cheap Chinatown bus from Boston to New York.
I think that when you visit a new place, you explore it more actively, and notice more details than you do when in a place that you (think you) know well. Your family surely has an established pattern of life and activities, and apparently those activities don't involve the wonderful natural landscape of the East Coast region they live in. I don't think the issues you're grappling with are really about the natural resources of the East vs. those of the West; the things you cite as reasons to live in the West are readily available in the East. You apparently never learned to take advantage of them while living with your family. Isn't that really the problem?
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Culture factor
While I appreciate Mr. Tennis' belief that the writer should discover what is important about the west and find it in the east, I believe he is over looking the culture factor. The culture of an area, i.e., how manners, outlook on life, attitudes toward others cannot be easily replicated. One may find friends who share the same beliefs and attitudes, but then one must go outside and deal with the culture at large. I'm from North Carolina and now live in a mid-atlantic city. I have also lived in the rural and urban mid-west, and Houston. Living here is very difficult as the population at large does not share te culture I value in the south. I have been honked at for waiting for a funeral to pass. I have been yelled at for stopping at a cross walk at a shopping center giving people the right of way. I have been yelled at by people waiting to cross because I stopped for them. I gave up on trying to teach my children to say yes sir, ect. (although they say it when we go to N.C.) and have settled for yes, instead of yeah. My son is the only 18 year old who will get me a chair if one is needed, stand up and shake hands when introduced to a new person. He has been teased by friends, also raised in an upper income group, but, fortunately, sees the value in manners. The reader needs to CAREFULLY consider what is important that can't be replicated.
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East/West
Couldn't she have been more specific? Bar Harbor, Maine is about as different from Del Ray Beach, Florida as L.A. is from Seattle. How is anyone supposed to give her any advice at all?