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I agree with some of the others that I like Tulsa more than OKC. But OKC is fine. As a native Californian who spends about half my time in Oklahoma, you might just like it here. People are the nicest I have met anywhere and it is very green. As you know the cost of living is very low. For me its a relaxed laid back attitude that I like. If you come here and are worried about what kind of government handouts are available you might not like it but if you have ambition you will do just fine.
Yes, benefits are lower and last less long, but it can be overcome, especially if you come from a very expensive state. Social Security will be less than a higher cost state, but as the cost of living is far lower the money goes a lot further. Housing can be cheaper, especially. And daily sort of cost are less as well. If you live in a high cost state, and get sort of disability or social security, you'll find here in OK it will last a lot longer. You still can't go take a long vacation or buy really expensive stuff, but the basic essencials are affordable.
Recently I've been considering my son's wish I move to Utah, and I almost considered it until I figured the cost. If you come from an expensive area you might find the usual costs are much more liveable here as well. If you are on social security, your amount won't change, but it well might go further than in a high cost area. But the same is true of the reverse. When you establish your finances here, and get used to having more to spend, you might miss it a lot if you move back to a higher cost area.
If you're use to somewhere where daily life is fast and everyone's in a hurry, then you'll have a lot of adjustment. I came from socal, where there is no word for slow down, and really love that part of OK. People here generally aren't in a hurry but there is a lot more options to fill the time if you need that.
If you can, make a visit and see the place and talk to people. There's a lot of open areas and you can find nature, and in Spring it turns green. Winters are a mixed bag of cold and storms, and warm breaks which can turn into snow in a day. The northern part of the state has the least tornados.
Best way to see how you feel about it is come and visit, and check out the place.
Vacaville (where those two families in the piece are from) isn't that great as far as school quality goes. Wealthier parts of the state are one thing, but much of the state has barely average schools or worse. I doubt their kids are going to be hurt by the move.
Vacaville (where those two families in the piece are from) isn't that great as far as school quality goes. Wealthier parts of the state are one thing, but much of the state has barely average schools or worse. I doubt their kids are going to be hurt by the move.
One reason I moved. For those with lots and lots of money, the culture supports excess, huge homes and overdone yards and all the 'stuff' on wheels so you can impress your neighbors. The 'poor' which constitues middle class residents trying to stay afloat and those who have given up, does the best they can. There are more programs with help since the state has a lot of money, and while the lucky/greedy/status addicted ones feel better about the difference. When I was a kid, real middle class people, even what we'd call 'poor' people were the norm. Our house was about the size of the house I got cheap as it is seen as 'too small, with all the little rooms'. My house is about the same size as the norm was back when Mom an dad were looking. Most of my cousins and I were raised in that kind of house.
At some point, the 'culture' of California, the gotta have bigger, flashier, and somewhere where 'them' can't find you took over. Before the personal disastors and family split, we were trying to figure out how we could move to norcal, in the mountains, before it got too expensive. This would include me, and my cousins which were a few years older and younger and raised very close.
Schools were better, I think, back when I was in school. The majority were aimed at the middle class. People with the money could use private schools, but the public schools at least in middle class areas was good. Even the schools in poor areas were more stable. But while it was supposed to be a state with less race discrimination, that really mattered.
So if you were in a 'good' school or a marginal one depended on where you lived and how much money the family had. Students who were white and had the apptitude were encouraged to look past the norm. Students who were not were encouraged by teachers, but the veil of racial differences was waiting.
The crush of population has stressed education there, but part of it is a still existing but not spoken about in public education. And as those who can afford it, private schools become more the norm in areas where the neighborhood can afford it still.
There are also a LOT of people who live in California, but as they grow older or retire or face the way classes of jobs dissapear, more move away.
I had (and have) health problems which leaving helped enormously, but still miss 'home'. Thing is, the 'home' I remember and cherish is and was the one there when I was a kid, and its faded away. And even THEN, parents were looking over the curiculam at schools and going private. Mom and Dad did as they noted the kids coming out of public K thru third grade tested way low on the list of successfully learning how to read, as phonics had been dumped in exchange for the latest, look and see. The school I went to was run by an Espiscopal church, but wasn't religious unless you chose. But they taught traditional phonics and did not pass unless the child actually did.
The best thing mom and dad did was that school. It gave me a love of reading and as I read all sorts of things, an varied choice in what I liked best while the kids stuck in public school were still struggling. Sixth grade I went to public school. I wanted to be around my local friends. The teacher passed out the quarter's book they would read on Friday. I took it home and brought it back on Monday having finished it. She said for me there would be a special reading list. She picked books much harder and I LOVED it.
Sadly, the rest, unless a parent decided it wasn't okay, were struggling with basics why those who skipped the first few public school grades for something better, and gained something which gave them a head up in *life* even if it wasn't part of school.
Same here. A lot of Okies moved west during the depression and WWII. Many are rebounding. You would not believe how many are here in rural Oklahoma.
I saw my high school yearbook online back in the late 40s. More than half of the high school students were from Oklahoma and Arkansas. They even listed their hometowns in Oklahoma. It was amazing.
We know of one guy from CA who bought 180 acres and a house sight unseen. He moved here and then started crying around when we had an ice storm. He said no one told him it got this cold here.
Back near the early 1900's, my grandfather's family starting splitting from the midwest to California. My grandfather was one of the first. When the Spurgin clan arrived they ended up mostly all in easy visiting space. My grandfather, however, didn't want to be a farmer, and left for California with a suitcase and shocked looks that he'd leave.
He ended up working in movies. He did more ordinary jobs, but if he'd stayed a farmer, the award winning sets of many a hollywood movie would be different. He was property manager and set expert and dress designer/approver for Gone with the Wind. Everything you see in the dress, decour and general style in that movie was as authentic as it could come. As a master set desigener, he could do nothing less.
That was after he married wife number 2, from Hollywood.
His family affairs didn't go so great, but while grandma wouldn't speak his name mom finally reconnected. But when she told him about him made sure I knew he dumped she and my aunt and grandmother when she was a teen. So maybe if he'd stayed, he'd have just been an unhappy farmer. But he would not liked it and I doubt he'd do it long.
Stubborness is a trait my family, both sides but definately his side, are all too, hmmmm born stubborn. I'm full in part of those genes.
It felt wierd when I found this house in OK and especially in a little town my great granparents would not be adverse to. And they think they won since I LEFT the city. I haven't moved back yet. I don't want to, though wouldn't mind a new view right now. But I'm very practical about it too. Yes, we're also practical.
I wonder how much those sort of values deeply engrained, of stubborn loyalty, of leaving being an escape, of doing it just because YOU decided to, not for anyone else, and being ultra practical when its less than practical.
Yes, but wayyyy different circumstances. The reasons now were economic. I had and still have health problems. I did love my work in programming, something made for me. But you need to be there, not sick without warning. And what I had then had no real treatment. Now its filling the tv medical ads, but then you just hoped something working against symptoms did. I did okay the first bout with it, but I was doing much better. It was not nearly enough in controm this time around. Not only was it risking health, but if one can't give your all, then you should be honest about it. And the physical problems were making it worse, and the stress was too.
Now, and when I moved here, it was financial. I didn't work long enough to add much to Social Security, not because I didn't want to but just couldn't. And every option is looked at with benefit/cost. I knew it wasn't going to have some of my most cherished people and places. But I couldn't afford to go to these places. I had a small apartment, and neighbors competing on either side for the best drama queen. I'd go 'shopping' and end up with a cheap dinner just to get away from them. And then it got worse when they moved and 'unregistered' occupants took over the empties. I had my dog and nobody stole from me since he stood there on guard if I was gone. But you could never relax.
Quiet, security, and that I lived in a house, old but a house, small but quite big enough here in OK were an undenyable lure. But after the relief rubs off, you want more. Thing is, I've been unable to figure out if I was to 'go back', how I'd do it. And a *paid for* house is one you do not let go of lightly.
And I didn't come here never having seen it. I visited my friends, and stayed with them while the house was in process. Now, I don't have that. And while it would be great to relocate in a place where I had more stuff to do, its no fun if you don't have the money.
And my pets remain safe. Without them, I'd feel all alone. Its hard that many are ten and starting to show health problems of old cats which may not be fixable. When they have chosen to cross rainbow ridge, I will love the younger ones and might try to move. But I may be the only human, but are not *alone*.
One thing I learned back when I was so sick I could never plan going anywhere since I never knew if I'd be sick, dealing with the damage from that now, is that mourning the past never gets you anywhere. It's over. You can't bring it back. You can take the lessons you've learned and make something new, but what is done is over and you can only remember the parts you cherish and keep looking ahead.
For me, now, the cost of living in Oklahoma is a very good thing for me. When I get feeling unsatisfied, or miss things which ended a long time ago for me when I moved, its time for some serious quiet thought. Life is about changes, not things staying like we wistfully remember, after all.
Given the option I'd still move to OK because it still is the *best* option for the present.
Let's see here, great weather, ocean and mountains, high crime, horrific traffic, Unfreakinbelievable high cost of housing and col in general so you live in a crackerjack box unless you are rich Cali, vs boring, flat, hot in the summer cold in the winter Ok. I don't think Ok is that bad a choice here, it's far from a no brainer like some CA posters would like to think.
My opinion on CA has never changed since I was a child - it's a fantastic place to live if you are rich, otherwise there are way better options.
Let's see here, great weather, ocean and mountains, high crime, horrific traffic, Unfreakinbelievable high cost of housing and col in general so you live in a crackerjack box unless you are rich Cali, vs boring, flat, hot in the summer cold in the winter Ok. I don't think Ok is that bad a choice here, it's far from a no brainer like some CA posters would like to think.
In addition to traffic jams (anyone live near the 405 out in socal when traffic is packed????) there is the smog. Riverside often had such bad grey much you literally couldn't see anything in the distance. And one of the major roads driving out of Riverside in winter, spring and late fall you could see the mountains. Come summer and the rolls of smog, just grey goop. No mountains of any clue they were there.
I was told by a doctor that my ability to breath in deeply had been damaged by the pollution I grew up in enough that it was measurable. That's what your're doing to your kids if you choose to live in a smog pit. OK is not my perfect view of things, but I have regained the deeper breathing over time. Where ever I go, I will not live in a place which is full of grey poison.
I used to take lots and lots of allergy meds and stuff for infections. I only use a little kids pink benedryl when needed. One reason why I don't want to go back to California unless its in the greener north.
nightbird47 - personally, I'd take a way nicer/larger house on a decent sized lot in a boring low crime area over the same priced dump in a high crime California area anyday, everyday. A choice like that wouldn't even begin to spark a debate.
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