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Well no offense but there are much nicer towns in CT than the towns you lived in. I'd be miserable in Meriden too (sorry Meriden folks) And sure when you move to FL, everyone is soooo happy to be there and they love to talk about how horrible the place was that they moved away from. For many people, they move down south and they do have a better life. But for others, they don't. But you'll never hear them admit that.
First of all, you are a native of CT. No matter how long you live in the south, you will never be southern and never be considered southern. Dont' forget that. So I'm not sure why you are taking offense to what I said about the south as though you are southern.
I never said that. I said that it's simply a fact that poor areas are often happy because they simply don't know any better. There is nothing to covet. I know it's not the most PC thing to say, but it's true. There are many studies out there that aren't very politically correct, however it doesn't make them true. Studies such as poor people are less educated, more likely to smoke and drink, have children younger, and more likely to be conservative. It's not about putting people down, it's simply true. I'm conservative and Christian btw so I'm not knocking it. I'm simply pointing out that this article is nothing new. You will ALWAYS find people living in lower income areas to be happier or SAY they are happier than those living close to major metroplitan areas.
themselves.
Actually studies will show the opposite. People in lower socioeconomic areas are more likely to smoke or drink and the divorce rate is HIGHER in the south than the north. That has been my experience as well and I have the research to back it up.
Neither is not having enough. Talk to someone who can't afford to feed their kids and keep their electric turned on. Or someone who just got laid off and has no savings. Or someone who is 65 but can't retire because they can't afford to. I'll take having too much money over not having enough anyday. But you are proving my point about the south celebrating being poor and wearing it like a badge.
Is it having money or the love of money that's a sin? I thought it was greed and the love of money, not your checking account balance that was a sin.
Sorry I don't mean to sound like I'm attacking you. I'm just pointing out how skewed these "studies" often are. Any class in statistics will show you how they will present one side of an issue to make a story sound more interesting. It's typical media.
No I dont think you are attacking me at all, I see this as healthy debate so its all good my fellow nutmegger!
I want to apologize to you for getting carried away with some of your statements (the clod hopping pig farmer thing)
I believe its the love of money thats a sin, Im not entirely sure what the Catholic Church meant by that
Yes having too much money is way better then not having enough, I know and so does my family, I grew up very poor (why do you think I lived in Waterbury? I was born at St Mary's Hospital)
The divorce rate is definitely higher in the south. Orlando has an incredibly high divorce rate yet the dating pool stinks somehow.
I may never be a true southerner but I do love it down here. But I never forget where I came from. Im still a UConn fan!
I will admit my life is a lot better down here, the rest of my family willingly admits they hate it and they want to return to CT. You'd be surprised, a lot of people who live here are from CT, NY, or NJ and they all want to go back up north, I love it here even though I will be going to Vegas in 10 months, Im leaving simply because I want something different now
And last I wanna say I do miss somethings about CT. The cool crisp May mornings, Summertime all around (better then summer in Florida) Watching snow fall outside my bedroom window, going to Jimmy's Restaurant on Savin Rock in West Haven, Lake Compounce, Driving through Litchfield County in Mid-October when the leaves are in full color. Being able to go to Waterbury and getting the most amazing pizza anybody can ever eat, I can go on and on
But I just wanted to reply to your message and give you my thoughts
No hard feelings, Davie!
I believe that everyone should live where they are happy. There is no doubt that some people's quality of life improves when they move. I moved to FL with my family as a teen in 1989. My dad's job transferred us to the Tampa area. We went from a dinky house in NJ to a gorgeous new house outside of Tampa. So at first it did feel like we were doing a lot better.
For me personally, I need seasons and I really missed those. If I could have been a snowbird, I think I would have liked Florida more. But I missed things about the north and I got so tired of people trying to convince me that I really didn't miss those things. "Oh you don't want to live up north. You just think you do." It wasn't the Floridians but the northern transplants who told me that.
Then I had the southerners who seemed to hate me because I was from up north. We lived in Riverview and in 1989, Riverview had nothing. It was a rural town with new subdivisions but not much else. The natives were very rude to me. I once overheard co-workers complaining about all of the yankees moving down south and stealing jobs.
My husband loves living here but his family is as southern as can be. My MIL did not like the fact that her son married a yankee.
I did like a lot of the Tampa area. Not all. Some of it is a dump. But north and west Tampa is nice and the people were much more open minded and tolerant. The rural south? Not so much.
I'm glad you like where you are though. Everyone deserves to live someplace that makes them happy
No hard feelings, Davie!
I believe that everyone should live where they are happy. There is no doubt that some people's quality of life improves when they move. I moved to FL with my family as a teen in 1989. My dad's job transferred us to the Tampa area. We went from a dinky house in NJ to a gorgeous new house outside of Tampa. So at first it did feel like we were doing a lot better.
For me personally, I need seasons and I really missed those. If I could have been a snowbird, I think I would have liked Florida more. But I missed things about the north and I got so tired of people trying to convince me that I really didn't miss those things. "Oh you don't want to live up north. You just think you do." It wasn't the Floridians but the northern transplants who told me that.
Then I had the southerners who seemed to hate me because I was from up north. We lived in Riverview and in 1989, Riverview had nothing. It was a rural town with new subdivisions but not much else. The natives were very rude to me. I once overheard co-workers complaining about all of the yankees moving down south and stealing jobs.
My husband loves living here but his family is as southern as can be. My MIL did not like the fact that her son married a yankee.
I did like a lot of the Tampa area. Not all. Some of it is a dump. But north and west Tampa is nice and the people were much more open minded and tolerant. The rural south? Not so much.
I'm glad you like where you are though. Everyone deserves to live someplace that makes them happy
The things I have heard about Tampa are not good, but then again 1989 Tampa is different then 2009 Tampa
My family moved to Orlando from Waterbury in 1995. We lived in a brand new suburb called Buenaventura Lakes at the time, we moved to eastern Orlando in 1997, then on to Apopka northwest of Orlando in 1999. We left Orlando and returned to CT in mid 2001. We lived in Meriden until 2004 and then Naugatuck from 2004 to 2006. When we returned to Orlando my God how it changed, I hardly recognized anything anymore with the exception of a few places
I guess when you grow attached to a certain place as a kid you dont want to leave. All I remember living in Waterbury when I was real little was when my mom and I slipped on some ice on Buckingham Street and I lost my first tooth. So almost all my childhood memories are here in Florida and I guess it feels more like home to me then CT does because I came down here at such a young age. Like I said, I hardly remembered CT the first time, and the second time I didnt like what I saw.
I can't bash Connecticut, I still have a lot of family there and I would love to go visit (Not right now though, I heard the highs are only in the 20s there, no thanks) But you see what Im getting at. Studies always say CT is number 1 for good stuff and if its not number 1 its not far behind, education, income, healthcare etc. Among other things like taxes, air pollution, energy rates which are ridiculously high or so I hear.
Every place is what you make of it. Connecticut is not for everybody, then again neither is Orlando, or even Las Vegas. I guess it all just depends on your situation financially, and emotionally and how your life plays out. We all decide our own futures, and if they don't turn out well we end up hating wherever it is we're living at the time as an excuse for our own bad decisions.
I personally choose Florida for the warm weather, beautiful girls, and lack of a state income tax (something I will enjoy when I move to Nevada!) Merry Christmas YankeeRose
BTW I have a few friends who are Florida natives and they could care less if Im a damn yankee, I suppose that attitude is only in rural areas. You said Riverview was rural then, its definitely not rural now
No hard feelings, Davie!
I believe that everyone should live where they are happy. There is no doubt that some people's quality of life improves when they move. I moved to FL with my family as a teen in 1989. My dad's job transferred us to the Tampa area. We went from a dinky house in NJ to a gorgeous new house outside of Tampa. So at first it did feel like we were doing a lot better.
For me personally, I need seasons and I really missed those. If I could have been a snowbird, I think I would have liked Florida more. But I missed things about the north and I got so tired of people trying to convince me that I really didn't miss those things. "Oh you don't want to live up north. You just think you do." It wasn't the Floridians but the northern transplants who told me that.
Then I had the southerners who seemed to hate me because I was from up north. We lived in Riverview and in 1989, Riverview had nothing. It was a rural town with new subdivisions but not much else. The natives were very rude to me. I once overheard co-workers complaining about all of the yankees moving down south and stealing jobs.
My husband loves living here but his family is as southern as can be. My MIL did not like the fact that her son married a yankee.
I did like a lot of the Tampa area. Not all. Some of it is a dump. But north and west Tampa is nice and the people were much more open minded and tolerant. The rural south? Not so much.
I'm glad you like where you are though. Everyone deserves to live someplace that makes them happy
When I was a teen circa 1983/84 or so, my folks almost moved us to FL (Pt. St. Lucie area), but decided in the end not to for a lot of the reasons you mention. (Ironically, we almost after that moved from lower Westchester to Stamford as well as my folks were expanding their business in that direction, but that didn't happen either).
I wonder when JViello is going to chime in on this sub-thread, I believe he lived in various parts of the south for awhile and has posted about this in the past.
If Florida is such a happy place why is it that it has some of the worst violent crimes? The show Cops never seems to run out of material in Florida.
Connecticut, as unhappy as it is, doesn't seem to be able to string together enough action to make it cost effective for the film crew to hang out. This is despite the known problems we have in Hartford, New Haven, Bridgeport, etc.
The happiness indicator as others have stated in this thread is interestingly inversely related to the educational ratings of the states with a few exceptions. (Maine?). It is also no surprise that New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut residents might be a little grumpy as they all feed New York City, the global city that never sleeps. This area is a center for high-stress jobs that keep the world economies afloat.
Absolutely dazzleman!
Davie, if you look at the thread "Floridians that moved to CT" you'll see comments from a Floridian about "criminals having the upperhand in the north". THIS is the kind of ignorance that drove me nuts! Especially since the northeast and New England rank the lowest in crime and Florida is always, always in the top 5 of states with high crime.
This is the kind of stuff I heard for 15 years. People making comments about yankees when they have never set foot over the mason-dixon line. I met loads of people in Florida who had never been north of Georgia! But boy were they chock full of opinions.
My mother in law came to visit a couple of years ago when we lived in Virginia. Don't try to tell her Virginia is the south. It's the north as far as she's concerned and she did nothing but complain about the horrible yankee drivers and how dirty it was up north. It's ignorance like that I can't be around. It makes me batty.
The words yankee itself is ignorant. The south started using the word during the civil war. Only problem is, it was a word used to describe all Americans 100 years earlier by the British. So the south basically stole a derogatory word used to describe all Americans and decided it applied only to the north. It's ridiculous. Had I stayed in a city, I may have a different view. But living outside the city where it was a mix of natives and new subdivisions with transplants really traumatized me about living in the south. Never again.
Absolutely dazzleman!
Davie, if you look at the thread "Floridians that moved to CT" you'll see comments from a Floridian about "criminals having the upperhand in the north". THIS is the kind of ignorance that drove me nuts! Especially since the northeast and New England rank the lowest in crime and Florida is always, always in the top 5 of states with high crime.
This is the kind of stuff I heard for 15 years. People making comments about yankees when they have never set foot over the mason-dixon line. I met loads of people in Florida who had never been north of Georgia! But boy were they chock full of opinions.
My mother in law came to visit a couple of years ago when we lived in Virginia. Don't try to tell her Virginia is the south. It's the north as far as she's concerned and she did nothing but complain about the horrible yankee drivers and how dirty it was up north. It's ignorance like that I can't be around. It makes me batty.
The words yankee itself is ignorant. The south started using the word during the civil war. Only problem is, it was a word used to describe all Americans 100 years earlier by the British. So the south basically stole a derogatory word used to describe all Americans and decided it applied only to the north. It's ridiculous. Had I stayed in a city, I may have a different view. But living outside the city where it was a mix of natives and new subdivisions with transplants really traumatized me about living in the south. Never again.
I'm not a fan of regional prejudice. There are intelligent and stupid people everywhere, good and bad people everywhere. And underneath it all, people are all the same. There are cultural differences. Up north, people are generally more direct with their views, while in the south, they're more likely to put up a polite front.
There's plenty of regional prejudice up here too, people who think the northeast is superior to everybody else. I really don't like this, anymore than I like the ignorant southern attitudes you describe. People here are fond of saying how 'enlightened' our state is, and compare other parts of the country unfavorably. But we have plenty of problems and issues here too. I think it's a bad way to think.
Cheer up Connecticut. I live in the south and I would trade every bit of this sunshine for a better education for my kids. The term "yankee" is still used as well as the occasional "carpetbagger".
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