while my parents were living in White Plains in the early '50's. We moved to Chatham, NJ when I was 3 and I have considered it 'home' my whole life. It was a beautiful area with big yards, trees, a pond that was converted to a swim club where I hung out in the summer. Never needed to go to camp. I was on the swim team, diving team, and learned to play tennis on clay courts. We'd take the train into the city (NY) regularly to shop, go to a play, attend a concert when Leonard Bernstein was the conductor. I took ballet and piano lessons during the school year. By the time I was in middle school (5th grade) I was allowed to walk or ride my bike to school if it wasn't snowing or raining. I loved it.
When I was 14, my father retired (at 55) and we moved to Southern California. My parents were from California --my dad was born there--and had come to NYC in 1947 when my dad's company transferred him there. He had bought land in the '30's (after his father died) in north San Diego county and dreamt of retiring to raise lemons and oranges. I hated it. No friends. My parents wouldn't let me ride my bike and I went to school 20 miles away, first a private school for 2 years and then the public high school in La Jolla because my mom arranged an inter district transfer based on the connection she had with the Girls' Vice Principal: they had taught school together during the Depression in the San Joaquin Valley . I couldn't wait to get out of there when I went to UCLA for college.
Stayed in the LA area, living in Westwood or Santa Monica or the Valley through grad school, first marriage, divorce, second marriage. My second husband and I moved with our almost 2 year old in 1988 to St Joseph, MO. Never looked back. Moved to Lincoln, NE in 1994--with by then a second son-- and stayed until we moved to Chapel Hill, NC in 2000. I've been in the Triangle area ever since: 17 years in Chapel Hill, 3 years in downtown Raleigh, and coming up 2 years in Durham in January.
I still consider myself a native of NYC and Chatham as "home". I loved where I grew up, was happy to leave California, never felt at home in MO or NE, and will always be a damn Yankee transplant here in NC. But I am content here. Both sons live near me. I expect to go feet first out of this house. No more moving for me!
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