Moving again...change is good.

As I prepare for yet another move the tedious task of painting over the walls in our current place has given me some time to think about my path in life. As a side note, I'm painting over a very overwhelming and potentially psychologically damaging pink that my daughter had to have when we moved in. I am working very hard to keep her from choosing the same color for her new room (I'll most likely lose this one).

Since I left Vancouver in 2002, my family has moved 5 times, this will be move #6. The amount we have moved around has always caused some tension, mostly as it relates to our kids. As a parent, guilt is part of the job. No matter how hard you try, you can't be perfect all the time and when you snap, get angry, or just can't take it, it always comes back to an image of the guy in the bell tower "my parents did this to me!!!!". So I have always been concerned that the frequency of our moving would leave my daughter socially challenged or insecure (for the record, she seems to adapt quite nicely, which I think is testament to the strength of kids).

When I moved to Huntington Beach to join a rock band (a blog for another time), needless to say there was a lot of uncertainty as to how things were going to play out here. The band had real connections and interest from record labels (which scared the hell out of my wife) so we didn't want to commit to anything financially (including housing). The one thing we really did want to do was to get a solid foundation for our kids. After three years and one dead band later, I found that foundation in my work here and within the community (not to mention the legendary poker parties I have been throwing for the past two years). Our new place has plenty of room and amenities, and is in a great neighborhood near my kids school. Its been clear to me that our choice is a good one as my kids have been freaking out with excitement every since we signed the lease.

Speaking of the lease, its not cheap.. While the economy here in Orange County is still strong, and my job is a good one, the cost of living here is a real fight. When I was in Vancouver, we had a nice house we owned, and a nothing mortgage. If I still owned it today, it would be worth double what I bought it for. However, as soon as my pay increased, I was transferred to Seattle which was more expensive. By the time my pay caught up with the lifestyle I had in Portland, I moved from Seattle to Orange County. On paper, things look good, but as far as my lifestyle is concerned, I'm still in the place I was 6 years ago. The average 4 bedroom home in my neighborhood runs between $800K and $1 million, and I'm not even close to being in the expensive part of town. Guess who's renting????

Moral of the story above is that the short term economic impacts of my moving has resulted in setbacks in lifestyle and finances that I would not have encountered in Vancouver. I left my family, friends, my band (which I really loved), and coworkers in an area that I called home for most of my life to set out to build a career with two goals. Create opportunities for my wife and I to travel and see the world later in life and to provide my kids the best education possible to ensure that they have the ability to make good decisions when they grow up. To that regard, the moving has been positive. The amount of moving we have done has really forced us to be a family. We all look inward to each other when there is a problem, and I feel blessed that the relationship my wife and I have with our kids is open and fair (even if it is a complete dictatorship). The kids consider HB their home and are turning into real Californians (i.e. people who have no idea what real rain is).

With regards to the financial rewards of the moving, they are what we call in the accounting business "intrinsic". Which means that while the value is there, it has yet to be realized. My moving has helped me in ways I didn't contemplate as I went through it. Mostly, networking and working with different styles of successful people. The path I took without the benefit of my friends, family or social network forced me to learn to develop strong relationships quickly, to learn what my weaknesses are and to build safeguards around me to ensure I'm not my worst enemy (still my biggest challenge). But most of all, its taught me that its good to push the envelope of comfort, and to not get too settled in. The uncertainty of change can be disconcerting, but in life, the only thing certain is change. So...the more you get used to that, the better prepared you will be to look on the bright side of change and not dwell on the challenges and frustrations that any change brings. To that regard, we should all train ourselves to prepare for and deal with change. I believe that our ability to handle change is one of the hallmarks that over time will shape who we are and how others see us.

On a side note, I am renting a U-haul next week, and I haven't had great luck with them. My civic still bears the scars on the back left rear fender when I creamed it with the last U-haul I rented. I backed into it without even knowing I did it. My brother was watching and was yelling at me, he still brings that up. My current rental also has some peculiar orange scars above the garage door where a U-Haul may have ran into the house...I guess I was never meant to drive big rigs.

Be excellent to each other!!!!