I don’t know if I’ve made this clear in other posts, but Meg and I are absolutely, positively, without-a-doubt moving to Austin, Texas around the beginning of August. Meg will be attending the University of Texas to get her Master of Science in Sustainable Design, and I will be working full-time (yikes!) somewhere to support us.
What we are excited about:
- warm (hot) weather
- the unbelievable music/arts scene
- the abnormally large number of dachschund rescues in the area
- tacos ‘n’ BBQ
- cowboy boots
What we are NOT excited about:
- the cheese factor of living in a city that shares my first name
- getting a new job
- moving
- finding an apartment
As our move approaches, I’ve been thinking more an more about quality of life — how easy we have it here in Cleveland, and how we might make it even better in Texas. For us, anxiety is usually only the product of Unknown Factors, and our Unknown Factors are big ones: Where To Live and Where to Work.
There was a New Yorker article on commuting a week or so ago (it coincidentally had a cool illustration of Glenn Ganges in traffic by Kevin Huizenga) that had a very practical way of looking at the Where To Live, Where To Work question:
Putnam likes to imagine that there is a triangle, its points comprising where you sleep, where you work, and where you shop. In a canonical English village, or in a university town, the sides of that triangle are very short: a five-minute walk from one point to the next. In many American cities, you can spend an hour or two travelling each side. “You live in Pasadena, work in North Hollywood, shop in the Valley,” Putnam said. “Where is your community?” The smaller the triangle, the happier the human, as long as there is social interaction to be had. In that kind of life, you have a small refrigerator, because you can get to the store quickly and often. By this logic, the bigger the refrigerator, the lonelier the soul.
Our triangle here in Cleveland is pretty small: we can’t walk to work, but we can and do walk to the grocery store, to the Chipotle, to the book store. I’m hoping we can find a similar situation in Austin.
As for the job search, I have this Bruce Eric Kaplan cartoon posted to the fridge:
If you are an employer — or if you know of an employer — in Austin who is looking for a writer/designer with plenty o’ computer, web design, and customer service experience…please contact me!
Well, you could always start going by the name of Cleveland.
The “moving to a new place for the spouse/significant other’s grad school” process can be very rewarding. My best friend did so, moving from Boston to Alaska, and it was probably the best five years of his life. (He’s now back in Massachusetts, but I think he’d move back in a heartbeat.) I hope you have a similarly pleasant experience in Austin.
Thanks, Pete! I’m thinking it will be a good time. Adventure, with a capital A…
Our triangle is much much smaller than when we lived in Greater Cleveland. But then again, we lived in Twinsburg (well out from Cleveland) and Bob worked in downtown Akron.
Still Austin is Not So Big. Although traffic sucks.
Oh, and we love Austin and tomorrow we are taking kayaking lessons, which we never would have thought to do in Cleveland, although I’m sure we could have.
kayaking! sweet. yeah, we’re renting a car on our next visit, so I’m going to get acquainted with traffic soon…
great excerpt from Kinky Friedman’s book on Austin:
“Like most other busy cities these days, Austin is not very effectively traversed by foot. Indeed, if you’re crazy enough to try, you might very well find yourself getting T-boned by a shuttle bus. There are places you can walk, jog, loiter, or hop around angrily in a circle, and we will get to these momentarily. But you must understand that “a walk in Austin” is primarily a spiritual sort of thing. You’re going to need a four-wheeled penis of some kind. If you want to fit in perfectly, I’d recommend a pickup truck with a “God Bless John Wayne” bumper sticker.”
One more benefit of working in Texas: No state income tax. You take home more of your paycheck! Also, avocados in Austin are, like, 10 for a buck. And there’s a place just outside of town called “Enchanted Rock” that is known as an energy vortex (like Sedona, Ariz.). Austin freeway traffic is worse than the 405 in LA at rush hour. So configure your triangle inside the city as much as you can. You guys are going to LOVE it down there.
this plan just keeps getting better and better!
Just catching up with my Google Alerts and found you listed in “Sustainable design” a bit ago. Thanks for sharing about the triangle. Just in San Antonio for AIA Convention ‘Beyond Green” A friend came over from Austin. He is attending planning school there. Sounds to me like you are going to love it. Go make a difference.