About a month ago, I made the decision to relocate to St. Louis. People keep asking me what brought about the decision to move, so I thought I’d tell the story here. This way, I can preemptively answer more people.
When I started thinking seriously about leaving NYC a few months ago, it was a sad idea. I have long been in love with New York City—with its energy, diversity, and endless opportunity. Every time I return from an out-of-town trip, there’s a point on the BQE where I look out the cab window (I always treat myself to a cab home from the airport) and see the Manhattan skyline. Every time, I think to myself, “Holy crap, I live in New York City!” Every time, except the last time.
When I came back from the Close/Far tour at the end of October, I expected to be excited to get back to the city. All along the way on our travels, I had found myself wondering what it would be like to live in the cities we visited. Chicago, St. Louis, Tulsa, Shreveport. I felt a little twinge of wanderlust, but I was in a committed, passionate relationship with NYC, and it didn’t occur to me that I might really stray. On my return, though, I felt strangely disoriented, as if I didn’t belong there anymore. When I saw the skyline from the backseat of the cab on the BQE, I tried to drum up my usual excitement, but I didn’t feel anything.
I got lost on my way home from the airport.
About a month later, on the first weekend of December, I woke up one morning wondering what it would take for me to move somewhere else. Would I need to rent a UHaul? Could I ship my belongings? How would it work? And I realized, as I started researching methods for moving, that I had already made up my mind without consciously thinking about it.
After it was established that I was, indeed, going to blow that Popsicle stand, the next step was deciding where to go. St. Louis was an obvious choice. I have family in Missouri and Illinois, and St. Louis is positioned conveniently between those locations. It’s also much closer to my musical collaborators, and will (hopefully) make some things, like playing shows and recording, much more possible. I have several good friends in St. Louis, and I even had a place where I knew I could stay for the first few months. I’d spent enough time in the city to know that it was a legitimate large city with lots of good stuff going on in the art and music scenes, but it was still unfamiliar enough to make the prospect of exploring exciting for me.
But really, underneath all of the pragmatic and emotional threads that went into the decision, the question was this: “I’ve spent nearly seven years in New York, and it’s been great, but what do I want to do with the next seven years of my life?”
I started daydreaming about buying a house someday and getting a dog (in my dreams he’s a French bulldog puppy named Wilbur), and having space for music gear and, hey, let’s get crazy, having a DISHWASHER in my imaginary kitchen, and basically having the stability and trappings of a more grownup kind of life. Those dreams could never become a reality for me if I stayed in New York.
This is what Wilbur will look like, courtesy of frenchbulldog.org
So I called my family and talked to my roommates, notified some friends and posted something on Facebook. I spent the next few weeks selling and giving away most of my possessions, then I packed and shipped the rest then got on a plane.
After my holiday travels I landed in St. Louis, and now I am starting a new life in this new year, and despite all of the unknowns (where will I work? How will I meet people? How do I get around town?) I feel more centered and confident than I have in a long time. I’m already the Foursquare mayor of my neighborhood library, and later this month I’m going to spend my birthday with my family for the first time since 2003. Oh, and it turns out that I still know how to parallel park.
In short, I moved for adventure, stability, family, art, and a better quality of life. I’ll always love New York…and I look forward to being a visitor there soon.
