They all look just the same...

...don't stay in a situation that is making you depressed. And it sounds like you are depressed. If you have everything - a great house, wife, car, job and lifestyle and you're still not happy that's depression. You can continue in your current life and eventually you'll start to numb yourself whether it's alcohol, weed, Xanax or a sexual tryst and soon you won't recognise yourself. You won't feel like your self. Listen to your soul - it's trying to help you.

You don't mention the possibility of kids but I'm assuming it's on the horizon. Maybe you're thinking about what kind of life you'd like to model for your children. I know some of my greatest insights have come from trying to be a better person for my son. Maybe your best self is not in a nice suburb and you just want to be the best person you can be when your kids come along.

I think if he and his wife have kids before they resolve this angst, he'll find himself, in his late 40's telling his ungrateful teenagers "If it wasn't for you, I'd still be living in the fun city!" Not fun for either of them.

You tragic soul.....first allow me to offer my apologies incase you ever encountered me watering my flowers outside....and sorry about the dandelions and clover....I actually didn't expect you-and Chemlawn-- when I moved to the Center of Cultural Death....I thought my kids would be playing in those woods...didn't realize my house would be an eyesore for all those Plastic Soul McMansions that popped up when the trees went down....

Wow! A cool hipster fund manager living next door! Gee WHiz!! I'd love some financial tips....whoops, I can't even afford my taxes now that you've moved in next door, forget about that! Your fancy enclave is MY nightmare, too! What a coincidence!! What do you say that you move back to the city and burn your house down, too? Then we'll BOTH be happy!

I smell and affair with the city dwelling secretary! Maybe not right now – but if the wife and the LW are on such different pages, and the husband is already feeling unhappy and put out, it really is just a matter of time. If the LW waits for things to change I’m afraid he’ll end up having a couple of kids and THEN having this major freak on his wife and their suburban life – and that’s going to cost way more then 50K.

So LW – get you and your wife to a counselor’s office! Figure out what your big goals are. If you’re on such different pages that for one person to be happy the other must sacrifice everything then you’ve got to ask yourself why you got married to begin with.

Before Mr. Tennis goes plugging New Urbanism, he should read Alex Marshall on the subject: http://www.alexmarshall.org/index.php?category=New%20Urbanism.

New Urbanism is a bourgeois aesthetic movement masquerading as a revolution in urban planning. It fails to take into account the economic forces that shape cities and neighborhoods, and winds up creating prettier but equally dysfunctional, automobile-based suburban sprawl.

Regards,

Jim Crutchfield

Long Island City, NY

I don't know what your solution is, but I do believe that some physical infrastructures (houses, neighborhoods, streets) are so ugly and soul killing that they can make you physically ill, and depressed. You seem to have found one such place. Too bad you found it just as housing prices are collapsing. But lucky you found it while young, newly married and able to adjust.

No amount of drugs, therapy and bowling league memberships can overcome the sickness of a car based suburban life.... particularly if you feel its pain so sharply and so immediately.

Your spouse probably needs to hear your pain and find away to adjust to your needs. She may have needs for security, social position, or space, that need to be met, but can probably be met by other houses in other neighborhoods.

Suburbs are sick... you are lucky to have realized it now. Listen to that feeling.

Learn about permaculture and how philosophy, building, community and healing can all come together from this interview with Mark Lakeman of City Repair in Portland Oregon (27 minutes).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYgQAfxXHqk&eurl=http://www.documentedlife.com/log/?p=350

Also from the same SE Portland scene (8 minutes).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVq0exoGySc&feature=related

LW, your instincts are self-preserving. Here's a good book to check out for inspiration: Little House on a Small Planet, by Shay Solomon. You sound like you probably wouldn't want to replicate what these people are doing, but it shows one what is possible and articulates exactly what is wrong with big houses- psychologically, environmentally, etc. It has inspired me think about how to shrink my and my husband's 1,600 square foot house down to about 1,000. Another good resource, with more high-end examples, is the Not-so Big House series by Susan Susanka: www.notsobighouse.com. Good luck!

Dear LW,

I say this without acrimony but as a straightup fact, I would indeed love to have your problem. I am kind of poor and cannot afford a house, in suburbia or anywhere.

I'm a little bitter, but I refuse to feel anger toward you. I know myself well enough to know that if I were in your situation, I would likely have some similar feelings.

I feel guilt enough as it is at having a decent apartment, a car that runs, and health care. I know there are others with so much less.

Signing off with love,

Another Human Being, Known on Salon as

about the two phd's but no discernment. Totally set aside the suburbs, new and old urbanisms, etc., arguments: how in the hell did you end up a captive of magazine common sense and the "everyone's getting the big mortgage" stimulation, trapped now in a place?

This is stupid, and stupid is not one reckless decision, but a way of not seeing things. For people in such materially advantageous circumstances, you come off as a spectator in your own life.

Solve that. Maybe move.