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SusanJ
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Lindsay,
I've done a lot of reading on this topic so I have some ideas but going after sprawl is where I feel things get unintentionally personal very quickly. But some thoughts . . .
I have a hunch that most of the people who live in the suburbs actually want city life. That is, if cities were all they could and should be they would be safe, affordable, and full of all kinds of families. I know many suburban families who would live in the city if they could. I live on the edge of a really fantastic urban neighborhood. It's walkable, it's full of businesses, it has culture. There are hundreds and hundreds of families. There are a couple good parishes. The houses are dense but cute. The streets are tree-lined. I think the neighborhood was just named "One of the Country's Ten Best" by somebody. BUT, you absolutely cannot buy a house in this neighborhood for under $500,00 and the houses for that much are very small two-bedrooms. It is very complicated to explain how and why we live here but suffice it to say that we really cant' afford it and we have moved to the extreme edge of the neighborhood where the rent is only exorbitant and not merely impossible and we have trash everywhere and drug dealers selling right outside the window. I dont' really blame families for looking at our stretch of neighborhood and deciding that this is not an option for them. And no one can afford the nicer blocks on one income. There are very few single-income families around here.
One reason our neighborhoood is so expensive is that it is one of the only places in this city to live if you have a family. The other "nice" neighborhoods are really, really expensive and not as family-friendly and the more affordable neighborhoods are often outright dangerous. There aren't middle-class options in most of our cities anymore. But people need to work in the cities so what do you do? Live in the suburbs.
There is a good amount of research (but you have to sift through a lot of conspiracy-mongering to find it) about discriminatory mortgage policies and urban planning in the middle of the last century. Nothing makes me angrier than driving past a housing project or seeing where a freeway smack in the middle of a city gutted a neighborhood. Urban neighborhoods--real, flourishing, middle-class neighborhoods--were destroyed. Some of it was intentional (housing projects built to replace slums) and some of it was "collateral damage" (building a freeway in a futile effort to reduce traffic congestion). It turns out that slums were pretty good at fixing themselves and housing projects are not. More freeways create more traffic congestion and more parking spaces create more parking problems. Major incentives were offered (especially to whites) to move out of the city and into the suburbs. And the cities were destroyed.
I hope all the suburbanites reading this don't feel attacked because, really, there aren't good options. Suburbs are all different, too. Around DC we have several close-in burbs that are really getting pretty urban these days. Other close-in burbs are still very much small towns with great community-feel. And then there are a lot of former-farm, McMansion developments but those are mostly farther out. There was an interesting article in the Atlantic a couple months back about the fate of some of these kinds of developments. In general I'm not a fan of the Atlantic but this article was really food for thought in our house.
I'm glad this conversation is still going. Obviously it's a huge interest of mine but I know that where one lives is very personal. And many of us don't really have a choice, anyway. I'm glad so many are interested in talking about things.
Susan
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Mom to Joseph-8, Margaret-6, William-4, Gregory-2, and new little one due 11/1
Life Together
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LisaR
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Susan, I see what you mention as being more prevalent on the two coasts, or maybe big cities like Chicago (2.5 hours from me) . But even Chicago, the SUBURBS are now the pricey option, and the city is cheaper. like Naperville- our good friends lived there with 6 kids and homeschooled in a home identical to mine, even built within one year of eachother!! They paid 500,000 MORE for it than we bought ours for, AND our yard is 4x bigger!!
They were told not to live any closer to Chicago than Naperville because it was "too scary". So, her dh took bus, Metra, and carpool into the city each day for his Archdiocescan job.
Here in my smallish city/big town, the attitude is that the city has gone to h**l in a handbasket, and the "in" thing is to be in the country, second best is in a new suburban subdivision centered around large new faux-praire outdoor shopping centers, or large new "community centers" that provide some self sufficient town type feel but not the real deal, kwim?
The upside is our area is SO affordable compared to most, Caterpillar is huge here and they are going very strong despite the rest of the economy on a downward spiral. We have homeschool firends who are upscale builders, and he's still got plenty of new homes he's working on...
I think my city/cities in general have been given a bad rap in recent decades.
Our city actually just started a few programs, one which is called "walk to work" and there are huge incentives for families/employess of the largest hospitals/childrens hospital/Caterpillar to buy urban homes no more than 2 miles away. There are some gorgeous mansions to midsize historical register homes, blocks and blocks of them, going for a song.
I really like most of the new urbanization philosophies.
I keep going back to natural order.
It just seems to make sense to my dimwitted little brain to physically be close to where you work.
We also know families who thought they were moving to "country" only to discover 5-8 years later that they were in the middle of cornfields turned new developments.
That is one reason I like our neighborhood specifically- we are kind of surrounded by state park land/preserves/and city park district woodlands.
a kind of oasis.
another thought about urbanites being less consumeristic is that we simply do not have the room. Even those large turn of the century mansions have no closets! We live 7 people (my oldest ds's are 5 11 and 5 5 so pretty big bodies!!) in 1800 square feet total. this includes the basement. if I want to zip over to Target to buy something  something has to go.
Yes, we DO have a 2 car attached garage, but it is a 1970's garage, and we put both the cars inside of it, so no extra storage there- barely room for more than 2 bikes down off of their hooks at a time!
We can't afford to build a storage shed for yard stuff,etc but thats fine. if we built one, it would probably "get filled".....
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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LisaR
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PS, I again want to mention that I think we all live in such varied locations, income levels, and what works for one might sound like a nightmare to another. I'm a sociologist at heart and this type of topic is very fascinating to me. I'm the type that read the book about Celebration, USA when Disney made their first psudo-community in Florida, and I'm all over Ave Maria Town's website- really interesting!
My parents almost bought a home in Orenco Station in Oregon, there have been national articles about the community there.
so, do any of you look at www.zillow.com???
if you'd like an ariel view of my neighborhood and what I describe (hmmm it looks like my property value went up a bit :) )
I'll give you a street name and zipcode. it is not my street, but close. The home I'm trying to talk happymama into is the one at the end of the culdesac
www.zillow.com
type in W.Saymore Lane, Peoria 61615 at the top, then use the little arrow in the upper left to zoom around.....
you can even see the state park!!
the kids like spying on our backyard....
__________________
Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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CrunchyMom
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| Posted: March 29 2008 at 2:35pm | IP Logged
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SusanJ wrote:
| I've done a lot of reading on this topic so I have some ideas but going after sprawl is where I feel things get unintentionally personal very quickly. But some thoughts . . . |
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Yes, I didn't so much mean it in the sense of judging people who have jobs in a city and are just trying to pick the best option they can for their situation. Like you, I would never intentionally make it personal to individual choices that families are forced to make.
But why are we forced to make them? Why aren't there more options of kind of "self-sufficient" small towns and cities scattered about instead of commuting being so much more of a necessity these days? What you spoke of is true--I certainly get sad when I see beautiful old homes along the interstate falling to disrepair in scary neighborhoods. I, too, live on the outer edge of two very trendy/expensive neighborhoods in our city. When you look at aerials of the city, the trees stop at the train-track behind our yard--we just made it into that area! And we do deal with drug dealers on our street despite the half-million+ homes across from us (not facing our street, but the back yards of these homes in an exclusive neighborhood).
Anyway, I visit my hometown in rural Alabama, and it makes me sad how built up it is as a suburb of Birmingham now, but its a yucky commute to Birmingham, and why, if there are so many more people and jobs, why there don't seem to be so many more jobs in the actual town, yk?
I read stories of the establishment of the West and such, and it just strikes me as odd that there were so many towns, cities and things established at a certain time in history, but nowadays, despite the growing population, people don't move to undeveloped places to establish new towns with new opportunities in the same way, but we just all stay where we are and spread out as the population grows.
Idk, I read stories about smaller towns and communities, where people live AND work, and I just wonder where and how you find that without being born into it?
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Lindsay
Five Boys(6/04) (6/06) (9/08)(3/11),(7/13), and 1 girl (5/16)
My Symphony
[URL=http://mysymphonygarden.blogspot.com/]Lost in the Cosmos[/UR
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Erin
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Taffy wrote:
Our closest city is a two hour drive away and is actually quite small, less than 200,000 people. |
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 Susan, are you joking? Is 200,000 people really considered small for Canada? (sorry if too off track but I have to know )
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Erin
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Taffy
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Erin,
Compared to our giant neighbour to the south, then 200,000 is definitely small. Even compared to Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg, 200,000 would be considered mid-sized. Sadly, Canada is turning into a country with mostly urban dwellers, leaving the large rural areas with virtually no political representation and land management is being left in the hands of large farms (in our area, anyway) whose main motivators isn't necessarily what's best for the land. We've been having major reductions in services and schools as a result.
More than you wanted to know, sorry, but this is an issue that is also dear to my heart. 
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Susan
Mom to 5 on earth and 1 in heaven
Susan's Soliloquy
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marihalojen
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Have you seen this film, Susan (and others)? It is coming to our Green Living Expo here in the FL Keys in May. As soon as I saw the release about exploring the effect of urban sprawl I thought of you and this thread.
"No Room To Move" explores the effect of urban
sprawl on sensitive wildlife in Florida. This documentary also examines how
Florida could accommodate the needs of its wildlife and its growing human
population through a development model known as The New Urbanism.
We'll also have the chance to view Garbage Warrior which looks right up my dh's alley, and
Gimmee Green, and a few others if we go.
Anyway, I've really enjoyed this thread, even though we have chosen to live fairly alternatively ourselves ( ) who knows how long we'll keep floating? It is a very interesting topic and I'm glad you started chatting about it!
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~Jennifer
Mother to Mariannna, age 13
The Mari Hal-O-Jen
SSR = Sailing, Snorkling, Reading
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Stephanie_Q
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Well, you know where I live - out in the country! I grew up in suburbs of various sized cities and I just love the quiet and the space out here. My ideal would be to live on a large lot in a small town - surrounded by trees and bushes with space for a small orchard, a big garden, city codes that allow for small livestock (like a chicken coop, perhaps a couple sheep or goats), lots of room for the kids to run and play and explore, but within walking/biking distance of the amenities available in town...but that's not terribly realistic so we "pay" to live in the country in terms of gas money and sacrificing other things.
I think it has a lot to do with your personality and the kinds of things that you like to do. We're only 3 miles from church (very small town <150) and 9 miles from the library, parks, (schools), and grocery store (small town <5,000) and we go out once or twice a week. If you're talking about going out EVERY day or going into a city to go to the zoo, museums, city parks and such things on a regular basis, then I wouldn't recommend living in the country. We've been seriously considering sending our oldest to Catholic school next year and we realized that driving back and forth every day, twice a day, would likely cost us more than tuition (although, admittedly, we have very reasonable tuition around here)!
In my opinion, the biggest drawback to living in the country on an acreage is all the extra equipment and work it takes to maintain! Forget about scooping the driveway and sidewalk - start up the tractor to blade the driveway. Time to mow the lawn? Tractor again - with a 5-foot mowing deck - or you'll be out there all day. And don't get me started on the mud in the spring, dirt all summer, and dust at harvest time...but I wouldn't trade it for a crowded, noisy city any day.
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Stephanie dh 6.01
dd 6.02, dd 8.03, ds 3.05, ds 12.06 at Catholic school.
dd 12.09 at home.
Baby boy due 10.13
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LisaR
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Stephanie_Q wrote:
We've been seriously considering sending our oldest to Catholic school next year and we realized that driving back and forth every day, twice a day, would likely cost us more than tuition (although, admittedly, we have very reasonable tuition around here)!
In my opinion, the biggest drawback to living in the country on an acreage is all the extra equipment and work it takes to maintain! Forget about scooping the driveway and sidewalk - start up the tractor to blade the driveway. Time to mow the lawn? Tractor again - with a 5-foot mowing deck - or you'll be out there all day. And don't get me started on the mud in the spring, dirt all summer, and dust at harvest time...but I wouldn't trade it for a crowded, noisy city any day. |
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see, you should move to IL!!! Land of Obama and the big Chicago Machine!!! we have a law that states that ALL school children have a right to free transportation to school, so us private school families (my oldest goes to Catholic High School THREE miles away!!) fill out a form in the school office, and get PAID BACK our expenses for driving. so, guess what our reimbursement was for 3 Miles driving 3 days a week (we carpool)
1,080.00!!!!! I kid you not!!
The extra equipment and work is a huge deterrant to us and what we had learned/heard/observed in others as well. funny, dh worked as a landscaper for years while getting his Masters, AND he does all our own electric, gas, plumbing repairs, you name it!! I think this is especially why it deterrs him. He sees how much time/money it takes to stay on top of re roofing/re plumbing/yard work (you better believe our boys work awful hard too!) and that realistically, with his work schedule, any more land and we would get seriously overwhelmed...
__________________
Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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SusanJ
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Thanks for that link, Jennifer. I'm glad to see that people are approaching this topic from all different angles. This is a very, very complicated issue and one that most of us have strong personal feelings about. On the one hand, we should have a certain amount of detachment but where we live impacts our daily life and it impacts the world around us. I see a lot of ways our culture wants to "have it all." Most of the examples that come to mind are not ones that apply to anyone on this board but I think the "ideal" that Stephanie describes is one example. A nice big yard and animals and gardens would be wonderful. If you were the only one in your town who had that you might still be walking distance from town or city amenities but if everyone has a yard it doesn't take long before "town" is too far to walk.
Again, these are very complicated matters and we all have to discern how to best care for the people God has given us and how to use the resources at our disposal. I would not consider myself an "environmentalist" but I do love the country and I want it to stay wild and natural as much as possible. Or I'd like to see the land cultivated in sustainable ways.
I'd be interested in reading more about the "new urbanism." What I've seen so far has not impressed me. The "town center" model seems to still rely heavily on parking lots to work. Parking lots do not usually indicate a "walkable" community. Also when a development is entirely new it is usually expensive. An advantage to an urban neighborhood--especially one that has remained healthy for decades--is that there is great variety in the housing stock. I don't live in an urban dream neighborhood or anything but we have a mix of fixer-uppers, newly renovated, luxury condo, English basements, etc. Relative to the neighborhood itself (which is, overall, expensive) there is variety in cost and amenities. So we can attract young singles, families, retirees. It makes for a more diverse neighborhood. Also the "new urban" communities don't usually support themselves with industry so the folks who live there still need huge freeways to get them back to the city for work.
If anyone lives in a neighborhood that contradicts what I've seen, please do speak up. Dh and I will probably come visit!
Susan
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Mom to Joseph-8, Margaret-6, William-4, Gregory-2, and new little one due 11/1
Life Together
[URL=http://thejohnstonkids.blogspot.com]The Kids' Blog[/UR
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LisaR
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SusanJ wrote:
I'd be interested in reading more about the "new urbanism." What I've seen so far has not impressed me. The "town center" model seems to still rely heavily on parking lots to work. Parking lots do not usually indicate a "walkable" community.
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oh no! everything that I have read/seen has been WALK to work, or in the very least walk to the train station which will get you to work.
Here, our program is to revitalize the 2 mile radius surrounding the major epi center of employment. Our friends just bought a gorgeous craftsman style home (1912) for under 100,000 through this.
google orenco station in Hillsboro, OR. That is more of a "created" space, but everyone seems to bike, or train to work.....
__________________
Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Jess
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I would love to live in the country so we could spread out and our children could run around outside more. They love the outdoors and have to play in our smallish backyard most of the time. Where we live the houses are close together and you can't let your kids out front by themselves. I would like to have room for a big garden and play areas. I am really a homebody (though I go against that a lot for the sake of my children ) so staying home a lot would be fine. We don't live in a town where you can walk anywhere so that isn't an issue. But we also live in an area where living in the country is very expensive (land and house prices), so I don't see it happening any time soon.
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God bless,
Jess
+JMJ+
wife to dh('96)
mama to dd(13), dd(11), ds(9), dd(6), and dd (2), and baby girl born Sept 14!
star cottage
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Philothea
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I've thought about this a lot, and I actually like the suburbs. I won't apologize for it. I like all that the city has to offer and want to be close enough to take advantage of it ... but I wouldn't want to raise my kids there.
I want a private yard for my kids to play in, but not TOO MUCH yard, because that's more work than my husband and I want to make time for. I like community and I think suburbs offer that ... we get along well with our neighbors because we have so much in common (similar jobs, young kids, hobbies, etc.). That wouldn't be the case in a place as diverse as the city, or as spread out as the country. Plus, there's a lot to do around here ... parks, classes, camps, museums, shopping, etc.
I would live in the country if and only if:
1) My husband were home all day (telecommuting or otherwise). I'd go mad all alone with the kids every day with no close neighbors to break the monotony.
2) We had MORE kids. I don't think it would be particularly fair to my two boys to essentially strand them in the wilderness with no one to play with but each other when they are used to playing with the neighbor kids constantly.
3) We chose a place within easy driving distance to "civilization" so hubby and I could do nice dinners out once in a while and I could do some decent shopping now and then.
4) We kept the homesteading thing to a manageable level ... a few goats, chickens and a veggie garden I could see ... more than than and, well, "farmer" is not my dream life, I'll tell you that much.
I would not live in the city with children unless I had the money to buy a home with very good security and a big enough yard for play in a nice part of town where we could easily and safely walk to parks, activities and good grocery stores. We're not rolling in dough, so that won't happen anytime soon.
I know how elitist that sounds, and I regret it, but I will not put my children or myself at risk if I don't have to. I would be a wreck every day of my life and that would benefit no one. Mother Theresa I am not. 
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LisaR
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Philothea, I think I'm alot like you! BUT the difference where I live is that the closer one is to the "city" the less expensive it is, and the "suburbs" around here are more expenisve, with country living being the most expensive. (although some would disagree with me and think that the pure country is cheaper, it is so far "out" that even if you save 1,000.00 on taxes or get a home for 10,000 cheaper, you pay for it dearly in commuting gas alone...)
What I see alot of (and it is sad, in a way) in the Midwest, is little villages and towns that are "empty" in a way of supporting themselves, but people will live there for the charm of the home or whatever.
There might be a store, or there might be a library. They might have a school. BUT everyone who lives there and in that area does 90% if not all of their real living, working, shopping, etc still in the city.
When we lived in MI dh worked for a Village Catholic Church, 15 miles out from a city of 150,000, and 45 miles out from Detroit.
It was called a "commuter village" because while it was all very quaint, no one really DID anything there except live in the adorable, and expensive, restored Victorian type homes.
Then a neat thing happened. It became walkable and self sustaining. BUT it took lots of brand new subdivisions springing up all around it to make that happen. A new grocery, a new medical building, a new library, new schools, new "town square" and much more wsa all built up in a matter of 6-8 years. But now it feels like suburbia more so than village. however, when it was just village, it was more of an empty shell. kwim?
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Stephanie_Q
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SusanJ wrote:
| I see a lot of ways our culture wants to "have it all." Most of the examples that come to mind are not ones that apply to anyone on this board but I think the "ideal" that Stephanie describes is one example. A nice big yard and animals and gardens would be wonderful. If you were the only one in your town who had that you might still be walking distance from town or city amenities but if everyone has a yard it doesn't take long before "town" is too far to walk. |
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I've been thinking about this and two things come to mind. I realize that I struck a nerve (after re-reading Susan's first post in which she clearly states that "It drives me batty when friends dream of their "few acres just outside of town"") and then I claim that to be "my ideal"  . Admittedly, I wrote that is not realistic, but the more I've thought about it, I realize that in some cases it could be. Take the small town that I live near. Population is <5,000. Make a 9 square mile grid and put all the businesses in the middle square - that's 8 square miles left for homes such that every family could easily have a 1-acre lot and be within 2 miles of everything in town. Double the population and 10,000 residents can have a 1-acre lot within 2 1/2 to 3 miles of anything in town. Now, I realize this is impractical in densely populated areas, but in Nebraska, where we're living "The Good Life", it's quite possible in most of our small towns. Just take a look at the populations in our state. We've only got 17 cities with a population greater than 10,000! Now, of course, all this assumes that everyone WANTS to live on a large 1-acre lot with a big yard and animals and gardens. I truly don't think that's the case and that brings me to my second thought, which is that we are all so different. We have different sized families and live in vastly different circumstances; from urban apartments in dense cities to sprawling acreages in rural areas. None of these choices are "right" or "wrong" and we only have to look to the Church's glorious array of saints to see that there is more than one path to heaven.
God bless!
__________________
Stephaniedh 6.01
dd 6.02, dd 8.03, ds 3.05, ds 12.06 at Catholic school.
dd 12.09 at home.
Baby boy due 10.13
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LisaR
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Stephanie_Q wrote:
SusanJ wrote:
| I see a lot of ways our culture wants to "have it all." Most of the examples that come to mind are not ones that apply to anyone on this board but I think the "ideal" that Stephanie describes is one example. A nice big yard and animals and gardens would be wonderful. If you were the only one in your town who had that you might still be walking distance from town or city amenities but if everyone has a yard it doesn't take long before "town" is too far to walk. |
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I've been thinking about this and two things come to mind. I realize that I struck a nerve (after re-reading Susan's first post in which she clearly states that "It drives me batty when friends dream of their "few acres just outside of town"") and then I claim that to be "my ideal" . |
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I, too, must admit that sometimes I see the people who want/have "a few acres in the country" (no one I know would "settle for less than about 5, honestly) as "takers" a little tiny bit.
Example: they "shop around" for the subdivisions/city neighborhoods to trick or treat in.
They still come in to MY library (and check out all the Five in a Row books, humph!) because they either don't have one (I pay taxes for mine) or they don't like theirs (too small) . They 90% of the time or more are driving into the city for everything, and yet they complain complain complain about how everything about the city is so terrible!
I suppose like the complaint that the city taxes are too high, and yet they use all of the city services, kwim??? (and ironically the surrounding counties/small towns are catching up- there is not the huge gap between city vs country taxes that we saw even 5-8 years ago....)
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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LisaR
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| Posted: April 02 2008 at 7:27pm | IP Logged
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Stephanie_Q wrote:
| Make a 9 square mile grid and put all the businesses in the middle square - that's 8 square miles left for homes such that every family could easily have a 1-acre lot and be within 2 miles of everything in town. Double the population and 10,000 residents can have a 1-acre lot within 2 1/2 to 3 miles of anything in town. Now, I realize this is impractical in densely populated areas, but in Nebraska, where we're living "The Good Life", it's quite possible in most of our small towns. |
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OK, well I"D be more than happy with one acre, and maybe you would be too, but again, most people I know want goats, or a cow, or chickens, many have/board a horse right now and want whatever the minimum is to keep a horse or two, etc etc and before you know it an acre is not enough for most people. My parents got an even two acres left over from the community of st john (which I already mentioned) and they can;t have animals, they are not "zoned" for it, and don;t have enough land. I am sure every county is different in this regard, but 2 acres even does not cut it in IL.
AND want to know what their taxes are?? 8,000.00 per year. YEP, their district is an example of the country getting smart and deciding they want to charge just as much (or in this case even more) than the city does, especially new construction..... 
__________________
Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Philothea
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| Posted: April 02 2008 at 7:54pm | IP Logged
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I wish my husband could work in Nebraska. You guys have an awesome Bishop in Lincoln, plenty of space, cute cities and low cost of living. It IS the Good Life!
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SusanJ
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| Posted: April 02 2008 at 8:01pm | IP Logged
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For the record I've been regretting the "it drives me batty" line for this whole thread. I've tried to remain charitable and I might have crossed the line there. None of you drive me batty--even those of you who I clearly disagree with on this issue :) I haven't been able to keep up this conversation for this long with any IRL friends, so I really appreciate all of you.
Susan
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Mom to Joseph-8, Margaret-6, William-4, Gregory-2, and new little one due 11/1
Life Together
[URL=http://thejohnstonkids.blogspot.com]The Kids' Blog[/UR
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LisaR
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| Posted: April 02 2008 at 10:07pm | IP Logged
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I think I have "allowed" myself to be hurt a little bit either here or IRL by comments that could be interpreted as True Catholic Life=Protecting Your Family=Not Having Neighbors=Living in the Country, therefore, I am not "Catholic Enough" because I am not on that track at all, but I take full responsibility for my own feelings!!
Dh and I talk about this all the time. We are the nutty types that will go to zoning meetings or listen/watch the city council discuss the new urbanization plans. We're fortunate enough to have a really connected and Catholic city- two council members attend our Parish. We have friends in all different neighborhood districts here, suburbia, and country, and village. We've compared and contrasted. My sister (Ave Maria Law grad) in Denver and I will compare and contrast some more- cost of living, "ideal" housing (yes, Nebraska has come up for both of us ) and so on.
It has been nice for me to learn from all of you, and it is fun to try to imagine us all homeschooling in our various locales.
__________________
Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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4Real Forums : Tea and Conversation
Topic: live in town or the country?
