When my pregnant wife and I decided to leave Los Angeles, Nashville was not on our list at all. I grew up in Northern Alabama, and at best, I thought Nashville was uninteresting - all Broadway and country music. But we wanted to be closer to family, and Huntsville, my hometown, was too small. So we gave it a shot.
Even nature seemed to be against us. In the year here, we experienced a tornado, (my wife: “Why do people buy homes here for tornadoes to just destroy them?”), being snowed in (“Why is it snowing in the South?”), a two-month cicada swarm, and a heatwave.
We decided to leave Nashville, but not due to weather. Living here underscored what was most important to us: finding our home.
I believe your place is your potential. I don’t know precisely where environmental factors stop and individual abilities start, but I do know that we accelerate or deter our goals through striving in the right environment.
When we moved to Nashville, I believed we could briefly delay that journey to our place. I’ve lived in six different states since college - one more couldn’t hurt, right?
But I wanted a diverse city with scale and vibrancy. I remember traveling back to Los Angeles during Nashville’s winter for work, and feeling renewed just in the airport. The buzz of the city energized me.
My roots will always be Southern. And I’m thankful for the year we spent here. But it’s time to build a home.