Board 8 > I need an outsider's perspective and possible advice for my wife and I.

(+) Yeah! (+)

I really like Nova. It's a great place to raise a family: good schools, diverse people, tons of green space and lots of history and culture. The weather is generally good; natural disasters are very rare, and it does not get extremely hot or cold. I'm a short drive from Washington, but also can take an easy weekend trip to West Virginia or the Shenandoahs or the beach. I understand that you don't have any friends here and miss the ones you have in Utah, but the area has a ton of veterans, what with all the defense contractors. You might be able to make some connections once things start turning back to normal. Making friends is something that you have to do anywhere that you move.

I disagree with foolmo's assertion that everyone here is depressed. Most of my neighbors and coworkers really like it here. I think it just depends on who you surround yourself with. I could be happy retiring here eventually. There are very few places in the country that I would rather live at this point, and anywhere I would rather live is so much more expensive than here.

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Bartzyx posted...

I disagree with foolmo's assertion that everyone here is depressed.

I wouldn't say it's everyone, but Nova does have an unusually large amount of people who move here for work and then turn into miserable work zombies. That doesn't mean you can't be happy here, but it takes more work than in a lot of places.
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Xeybozn posted...

I wouldn't say it's everyone, but Nova does have an unusually large amount of people who move here for work and then turn into miserable work zombies. That doesn't mean you can't be happy here, but it takes more work than in a lot of places.

I think there's a lot of civil servants who take a lot of pride in their job. And if they become "zombies" it's because they believe in the mission. And at least it's for the country and not some corporation, for whatever good that is.

At any rate, I'm not sure what's so terrible about moving to an area for a job. That's not any worse than people who get "stuck" in their dead end little towns because they're scared to leave (for whatever reason). Those people never really seem all that happy to me.


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A good rule of thumb (many will disagree with this) is to put your wife's interests over your own. Thus you should probably stay for now. Plus, yeah, like has been said, find new friends where you're at. Find out what is available there that can be fulfilling, etc.

Of course your wife may find a new opportunity in Utah sometime in the future, so you could stay open about moving back at some point.

To be clear, depressed doesn't mean you can't be happy. I didn't know the difference until I moved 1.5 hours south and saw what happiness was down there. There's a serious culture of negativity and lack of love in Nova, unlike cities like NY. Maybe parts of LA are similar, never lived there but heard stories.

But if Baku is from Utah he is surely used to a form of happiness that absolutely does not exist in Nova or the mid atlantic in general. Central VA does have the southern charm to it while not being too far, so I def recommend everyone to check it out.

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