Flagstaff - Husband Says Yes - I Say No (home, high school)

[country pride]

Ive lived in Flagstaff and liked it there. Yes, its cold country in the winter, but thats what appealed to me, the real 4-seasons. It is a tourist town, and a bit pricey, but pretty in so many ways. Work might be an issue during the winter, just like it could be anywhere else, if youre in construction or some seasonal field, but the only reason I left there was because there was a job offer at the same time, I was trying to get out of a relationship, and the window of opportunity opened up just in time.
Id prefer the forest-type of living ANYDAY, next to a small country town.
Do you really want to commute about 2 1/2 hours every day, one-way, to Phx though??

[stilldirrty]

Sounds like your husband only wants to move for himself, what about the children how do they feel about this?

Remember if you do decide to move, you can always bring your kids with you. Tell them

"How would you like to go to a different school in a different state. Experience a new life. Your kids would have 3 large universities. (NAU being the smallest.)

There is University of Arizona in Tucson (THE BEST ONE), ASU in Phoenix, and NAU in Flagstaff.

They can move to go here to college. -- Would that be lucarative for your kids?

[poolgirl51]

Originally Posted by nowannamove

Thanks for your replies. You are correct in your statements. If we did not have children moving would not be such an issue. I would 'go along' easily just to support my husband.

But I don't want to disrupt my kids lives or mine. Particularly my oldest son, the Junior in Highschool. He went through some rebellious times last year and is stable now. I don't want to take any chances of messing things up with him.

I posted here because I'm desperate to either learn that Flagstaff is an awesome town and so if I allow my husband to force this move I will not feel so guilty for betraying my kids. I would not want to tell my husband 'no' if Flagstaff truly is a great place. Or I may learn that Flagstaff is a total pit, and that I have to put my foot down regardless of my husband's demands.

Rich asked if I have a job. I work as a marketing consultant, but mostly just build websites. That I can do anywhere. But I also teach yoga (classes and private sessions) and have positioned myself as a relatively well known yoga instructor in town. I'm in the process of producing yoga videos, which I will have to put off if we move. I'm also enrolled in school to become an RN. Moving will cause problems with that.

Yes, my husband is wanting to move for a small amount of money. BUT he is not miserable or burnt out at his job. I think that his problem is wanderlust - one of you called it 'grass is greener'. He is always looking at new cities, new cars, new jobs...

I agree with the poster that said you can be happy wherever you are. That is so true. When we first moved here I did not like it. It took my children and I nearly three years to adjust. And now that we have found happiness and adjusted my husband wants to move again. Sure I could move to flagstaff and be happy, but what about my kids? It seems wrong to move them. They do not have the coping skills of adults, and plus my husband PROMISED that we would not have to move again until they graduated. Which I in turn promised them. Now he is asking me to break that promise. So, if I'm going to break a promise to my kids, I want to be sure that the city is a good city and that, while they may not want to move, that it is in their best long-term interest to do so.

I really feel for you and understand how hard it is to make this decision. We moved 5 times in 12 years...all corporate moves. I found each move enriching as we learned about the new locations and made new friends.

I believe that your skills (Yoga and web design) will translate very well to Flagstaff. It is a college town and you have Sedona nearby. As you said you can do the web design work anywhere and there is always a demand for good Yoga instructors as Yoga continues to gain popularity.

We moved from Florida to Northern Arizona and we love it here. I was born and raised in Florida. We didn't leave the state, the first time, until I was 35. But our situation is much different as we don't have children.

Good luck with your decision!

[SedonaShadow]

I live in Sedona and have spent a lot of time in Flag. I have never had a thought that it is dirty. Nor have I ever thought any part of it was unsafe. It's a typical college town with lots of tourists, especially in the winter. I don't find it an expensive town and all the neighborhoods I've driven through are very attractive. Yours is a typical problem that I can relate to. I moved my family years ago at the hint that I could make more money anywhere. I know it scared my wife but the kids actually loved it. Yours is an extreme; hot/sea level to cold/7500'. Men look at it as an adventure. Women look at it as, well, anything from a civil war to armageddon. Good luck!

[Gretchen B]

I can sympathize, nowannamove (very appropo user name). I'm fortunate, though, in that my husband is almost the opposite of yours when it comes to changing jobs and moving. He hates it even more than I do! However, things do change and after living in the same town for 13 years, (with my 4 kids going to the same great schools with the same friends that entire time) we moved 2 times in the next 7 years, with at least one of the kids being in their Jr year of High School each time. While it was an adjustment for them, they did just fine and made new friends. Our last move was the big cross country move and only our "baby" moved with us, and he was ready for his Jr year. I thought for sure that he would head back to our old stompin' ground once he graduated, but he loves it here in AZ. My daughter and her husband have also moved here, so that is good, too.

I think Ponderosa brought up some valid points about waiting. I don't know if there ever really is an optimal time to move when you have kids. I sympathize with you having a husband with that wonderlust disease. I have an older friend with such a husband, and he's been moving her around the country about every 2-3 years for the past 20 years! I think he's lookiing for paradise, and he's sure he's going to find it in the next place they move to. Of course, his enthusiasm is always short-lived. So I can understand why you hesitate to move, just for the sake of going someplace new.

I would like to reassure you that most of us in AZ consider Flagstaff to be a very nice place to live or visit. Many people would love to live there, but the cost of living is quite high. If my kids were still in high school and looking for a college, NAU would be a choice I'd hope they would make. So you might look at a move now as a possible advantage when it comes time for college. You might also consider that very soon your kids will be having to switch schools anyway, in the sense that they'll be off to college, and so things are destined to change regardless of where you live.

I do hope that if you all make the move to Flagstaff that it will be the last move you'll have to make for a long time. Moving (or deciding whether or not to move) is always a challenge.

[aquila]

It seems to me if you live in a small wealthy town in Florida, then any other place is going to seem a lot more negative to you than where you currently live.

Personally, I can't stand Florida. I've been to some wealthy areas there (or at least "well-off) and I wasn't impressed in the least. I think Florida is too hot, humid, flat, unmanicured and simply overrated. But that's my opinion, much as you see it differently. I love Flagstaff. It would be a dream of mine to live there. But to each his own.

[Floridahater]

Originally Posted by aquila

It seems to me if you live in a small wealthy town in Florida, then any other place is going to seem a lot more negative to you than where you currently live.

Personally, I can't stand Florida. I've been to some wealthy areas there (or at least "well-off) and I wasn't impressed in the least. I think Florida is too hot, humid, flat, unmanicured and simply overrated. But that's my opinion, much as you see it differently. I love Flagstaff. It would be a dream of mine to live there. But to each his own.

I utterly despise FL. I wish I could move to Flagstaff, but $ preclude me from doing so. Go for it!!!

[Floridahater]

AMEN!!! I'm ready to go!!!!!!!!!

[carecare7]

I live in Flagstaff and have for ten years now. Here's what I see and experience.
Flagstaff is a very liberal, Obama, college town but the people here are friendly. It is a small town and traffic slows by 9AM every morning. People have good manners, are environmentally conscientious and love our peaks and pine trees. There's a huge homeschooling network here and some excellent charter schools. The local public high schools are not as bad as some others in our state.

Flagstaff is an outdoors town, with hiking trails (urban trails) all over the city and cross country skiing and down hill skiing. Kids can go sledding at the local practice field at the university and sports fans get to interact with the state football team, the Cardinals, every summer when they do their high altitude training. There is a museum here about the Native cultures, the geology and anthropology of the Colorado Plateau. You can participate in an actual, ongoing archaeological dig at Elden Ruins here in town. Flagstaff is next to two major Native American reservations so their cultures (and others) are very present here. Flagstaff has four seasons which means beautiful colored leaves in the fall, snow and snow men in the winter, flowers everywhere in the spring and green trees all over in the summer. Drive back beyond Route 66 and you will see the backside of town where it is so beautiful.

There are a couple of crime areas such as Sunnyside and Lower Greenlaw but otherwise it is very safe here. The high rape and assault crimes are mostly with the college students in and around NAU and the previously mentioned bad areas. Everyone recycles here and a lot of people drive Priuses, the hybrid cars. We have city buses that are being converted to hybrids and we have not only the wonderful city library (that doesn't charge overdue fines until way past 45 days when they have to send you a letter) and but also the university library.

There's Wupatki (Indian ruins) and Sunset Crater monuments, Barringer (or meteor) crater nearby, Walnut Canyon Indian ruins, Oak Creek and Sedona's red rock formations not far off, as well as the white buffalo and Grand Canyon.

We have Thai, Peruvian, Chinese, Italian, Mexican, Japanese and American restaurants and some really cool coffee houses. There's a lot of wonderful parks, with skateboard parks included in some and a movie theater. We have a fairly good hospital here as well.
There is a real symphony, a center for the arts and lots of arts, cultural, crafts and science fairs here.

Flagstaff IS expensive, they call it "poverty with a view." The house I am renting is about 1600 square feet and the selling price on it would be around $300,000+. My rent is $1200 a month but normally it would be as high as $1400 for this house.

I love the beauty of this town, the very clean air and the fact that it is not overrun by grumpy, nasty, retirees or good-old-boy rednecks like Prescott or Prescott Valley (PV) areas. My neighbors wave to me and smile. When I lived in the Prescott and PV areas, they never smiled at me or even spoke to me but here in Flag, people smile, wave, bump into each other in stores and are so friendly. At the library, the bank, the stores, everywhere, people smile and are friendly, unlike Prescott and PV area where everyone frowns and is grumpy without good manners.

I don't work, I stay at home and there are excellent volunteer things I could do if I wanted to. If you want to work, jobs don't pay much. I do a lot of my shopping online because it is a small town but even so, I LOVE it here. We just had the county fair in the pines at Ft. Tuthill and it was so much fun and in such a beautiful place. We have the Lowell Observatory where Pluto was discovered. You can have Navajo Tacos with Navajo fry bread, YUM! at Cameron Trading post, some 50 miles away. There's Jerome, the town perched on a hill with a million-dollar view, or Motezuma's well, both about an hour south of Flagstaff. There's just so much to do and see in and around Flagstaff and Northern Arizona. Where else can you go from snowy peaks and city to warm desert vistas in 3 hours? Arizona!

I am an adult Army Brat that was moved around all my life and my Mom always made our moves an adventure. How your kids deal with it has a lot to do with how YOU present it and act. If you are depressed and complaining, they will be as well but if you act interested and excited about your new home, they will be too. A lot is up to you.

All I know is, for men their work is their life; they judge themselves by their work satisfaction. Was your husband a military, missionary or diplomat brat growing up? If so, he WILL feel restless and want to move every few years. I did too, until I came to Flagstaff and felt at home for the first time in my life. I was raised to be courteous, friendly, and happy and finally, I found a town that reciprocates that all around me.

I hope I have allowed you to see an different view of Flagstaff. If you do end up moving here, post that and I will try to give you my e-mail so I can welcome you here and let you in on the cool places to eat and do stuff. Good luck, whatever you do.

[poolgirl51]

Carecare, what a beautiful post! Thank you!