Just under two weeks ago we taped up the last moving box, loaded our (terrible) rental car up with last minute "have to take this with us" items, strapped in the pets and said good-bye to Philadelphia forever. Forever sounds so definite but in reality we're not likely to move back there again. Two days of driving- logging 17+ hours in the car- and we saw something to this effect:
Welcome to Madison
(pop: 233,000)
So here we are in Wisconsin! Never in all my days did I think I'd ever live in the Midwest, let along Wisconsin... but thus far Madison is proving to be a charming little city.
Why did we leave Philly, home of the cheesesteak, water ice, oh and apparently liberty and freedom? M got a job offer that was right up his alley and too good to turn down. You see M originally moved to Philadelphia for graduate school and I followed him there the next year. He was a PhD student at one of the universities in Philly until this past summer when we both realized that he wasn't happy in his chosen field and consequentially we weren't happy as a couple either. The thought of three or more years of his unhappiness and daily frustrations (he was about to start his third year of studies) and I was ready to beg him to leave... but of course it wasn't that simple.
I'll spare you the details suffice to say that we've had a stressful past nine months and we're thrilled to be finished with that chapter of our lives.
But I'll miss Philadelphia. It's people and food and row homes and nightlife. The gritty side of the city that we all as city dwellers disparage out loud to one another at cocktail parties but secretly love. After all that's what makes us city folk.
So we've said good-bye to the City of Brotherly Love (there's a misnomer if I've ever heard one) and hello to America's Dairy Land. I have a feeling we're in for one heck of a ride. Oh and did I mention that winter is coming to Wisconsin?
Stick around. It'll be fun times for all.
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