blooming where life plants us

Pardon my absence over the past few days. I’ve been knee-deep in boxes and packing tape.

Yep. Moving.

This will be our fourth home (third city) in three years, and while each of the moves has made practical sense (when we moved from mid-Michigan to Chicago, we were following a job opportunity; when we moved from Chicago to southwest Michigan, we were looking to live closer to family and in a lower cost-of-living region) I have to admit there’s also been a large dose of “grass-is-greener” syndrome involved in each move.

The problem isn’t that I don’t like the places I’ve lived. The problem is that find something to love about every place I visit, and even many I’ve never been to. I’ve imagined myself a happy urban dweller in New York or San Francisco; an off-the-grid farmer in Idaho, in a cottage in a quaint seaside New England town, and a resident of a variety of Midwestern cities, large and small.

I come by my nomadic past honestly: I lived in about a dozen homes before I was eighteen. And due to changing circumstances mixed with wanderlust, I’ve moved well over a dozen times since then (I’m only 31). No matter where I go, after the honeymoon period wears off I find myself wondering if there’s someplace else out there that’s..better. More, you know, me.

In the past few years I’ve definitely started feeling more ready to settle somewhere, and we’ve wound up in a great place to do it. The little city I live in is cute, interesting and family-friendly, with great schools and close proximity to Chicago. Several of my oldest friends live here, and my parents and in-laws are within a stone’s throw. I have a great support network of family and friends—the type that takes years to cultivate, and the sort that meant that when I stayed with Clara in the NICU for 11 days, I never once had to worry whether my four older boys would be cared for. I’m happy here and most days, I can see a future for us here: the boys graduating from the local high school, family barbecues with cousins playing in the yard, shopping at the indie bookstore, playing in Lake Michigan, visiting local galleries and wineries.

But there’s still that little, bitty part of me that thinks maybe life would be better if I moved back to the city. (It almost happened this spring, but we decided that the tradeoffs were too great, at least at this point in time). The same part of me that often wonders if one day we’ll wind up in, say, California, our boys tanned and sun-bleached blonde. Or Europe, our family multilingual and well-fed. Or Utah, all of us…really, really nice (sorry, is that just a stereotype?) I’ve spent a lot of time wondering what kind of place would be most “me”, and make me the happiest. Lakes or trees? Skyscrapers or manicured lawns? Seasons or year-round sun? Diversity or down-home friendliness? Of course, the truth is that there is no one place that’s perfect, or that suits or defines me best. They all have their good sides and bad sides, just like anything else.

What’s wrong with daydreaming about living elsewhere? If it’s just a fun once-in-a-while fantasy, nothing much. It’s when it hinders you from really allowing yourself to be part of a community that daydreaming gets in the way of happiness. In the past, I’ve allowed that nugget of “maybe we’ll end up somewhere else” to keep myself from really belonging to a community. In the past, I’ve stopped just short of taking the steps necessary to root myself: I’d look at house listings, but never started the process of getting a mortgage (and, you know, good luck with all that NOW). I’d invite the boys’ friends over for playdates, but not their families for dinner. In essence, I always had one foot out the door…just in case. And not only is that unfair to me, but it’s unfair to my kids as well. Meaning, yay! I can throw in a dose of mommy guilt too.

I’m not going to do it anymore. There’s no guarantee of job security today or tomorrow, of course; and it’s always possible that an opportunity elsewhere will one day get us on the road again. No place we live will ever be perfect or have everything I would look for in a hometown (diversity AND good schools AND safety AND friendly people AND culture AND nature AND affordability). And I have accepted that I am going to love something about everywhere I visit, whether it’s New York City or Duluth. But I can’t let that keep me—and my kids—from being happy where we are, even if where we are isn’t completely perfect. And part of that happiness is allowing ourselves to really belong.

Have you ever had a hard time feeling rooted in a place, or found yourself fighting chronic wanderlust? Has it gotten in the way of your happiness?

Other helpful posts like this:

Sunday Morning Tea: This Tenuous Life Learning to embrace the ordinary Homeschool, private school, public? Education choices and the Ideal Mother Sunday Morning Tea: This is your life.