Hopefully Not Off-Topic: Grief, Relocation, and Geographical "Cures" (Oxford: apartment, rentals)
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This forum has been helpful in many ways, because sometimes you just need someone to talk to about extremely off-beat subjects. I realize City Data has a forum for Grief issues, but this really has to do with Maine.
My remaining parent died in the spring of 2012. I remained in my hometown for the greater part of my life, particularly in my parents' old age, for the sake of being near family. Although I have siblings all alive, they either do not live in the hometown (PA), or there has been an estrangement that can't be overcome. As soon as all efforts at overcoming the estrangement became clear to me, I began to be interested in "leaving."
God works in mysterious ways, and in the past year-and-a-half, three "sure" moves, first to Oxford County, then to Penobscot, and most recently, to Franklin, have fallen apart for different reasons at the last moment. So as painful as it is to ask this online, I need to determine whether grief not only for being "orphaned" is insidiously responsible for my desire to relocate, but if on-going grief over siblings waging sad wars is even more of a motivation. (I have done everything humanly possible to overcome the barriers, and since money talks, the estate closure was one way of proving it. But the efforts were to no avail.)
I have lived in Florida, Colorado, and California at various times. I dislike warm, hot, humid or arid places. A sibling I'm on good terms with reminded me of how much I always wanted to move to France. While I'm not totally without means, I am on a fixed income. So I added France + "a place like home" + United States, and that = Maine.
I'd appreciate responses from anyone who has come to Maine not only as a way of growing toward a new life but as a way of escaping an old one. My boxes are packed, my movers are the kindest guys in the world (I want them to move me to Maine specifically so they can legally marry), and it's not as if I'm sitting here in my easy chair thinking of things that would be nice to do in the sweet bye-and-bye. I'm a mass of nerves and conflicting impulses, and my hard drive and Inbox are choked with emails to and from prospective landlords. (I am not in a financial position to purchase a home.) People talk about the stress of moving, but I think the greatest stress of all is the gearing-up period before the move has even incarnated in the form of cardboard boxes and strapping tape, because one still is in the "old world," and the pull of the old world on the heart...can probably bring about coronaries.
It would be an act of kindness particularly from folk in my demographic (55+) to hear that grief was a reason to leave a former home state where one has spent the greater part of one's life. I do realize that this is an intensely personal subject and that I may receive no responses at all, but it's worth the risk to simply ask it.
No--this question is not specific to Maine in general, but it is specific to Maine for me.
... My remaining parent died in the spring of 2012.
My condolences on your loss.
Quote:
... So as painful as it is to ask this online, I need to determine whether grief not only for being "orphaned" is insidiously responsible for my desire to relocate, but if on-going grief over siblings waging sad wars is even more of a motivation. (I have done everything humanly possible to overcome the barriers, and since money talks, the estate closure was one way of proving it. But the efforts were to no avail.)
Grieving is an odd process that I do not entirely understand.
In myself, I find that at times, I recall conversations / debates and I get up caught up in them, and now I have the perfect response. But, .. I recall the other person has been dead for years.
A couple years ago, my mother passed away. I went out for the funeral, we were all given copies of the will [most of it referred to items / properties that no longer existed]. The day after, the siblings met and we came to a very simple agreement, a five way even split. We were all in agreement. 18 months later, when the final final revision of the distribution was sent to each of us [One sibling had convince the estate lawyer to give her 80% of the estate]. Suddenly everyone lawyered up. After the dust settled, none of them talk to each other. With money in the air, teeth were flashed and now they all hate each other.
I am so glad that I live 3,000 miles away from them.
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... I have lived in Florida, Colorado, and California at various times. I dislike warm, hot, humid or arid places. A sibling I'm on good terms with reminded me of how much I always wanted to move to France. While I'm not totally without means, I am on a fixed income. So I added France + "a place like home" + United States, and that = Maine.
I have been to France a few times.
Your logic is, well, you derived an odd answer. [I mean no insult, I like odd]
I too dislike hot, humid and arid places; Maine is good for folks like us.
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... I'd appreciate responses from anyone who has come to Maine not only as a way of growing toward a new life but as a way of escaping an old one. My boxes are packed, my movers are the kindest guys in the world (I want them to move me to Maine specifically so they can legally marry), and it's not as if I'm sitting here in my easy chair thinking of things that would be nice to do in the sweet bye-and-bye. I'm a mass of nerves and conflicting impulses, and my hard drive and Inbox are choked with emails to and from prospective landlords. (I am not in a financial position to purchase a home.) People talk about the stress of moving, but I think the greatest stress of all is the gearing-up period before the move has even incarnated in the form of cardboard boxes and strapping tape, because one still is in the "old world," and the pull of the old world on the heart...can probably bring about coronaries.
I am venturing a response; because we moved to Maine, to reach out to a different lifestyle. To get away from our previous box. To start fresh.
Maine is a great place for fresh starts. For new adventures.
I am venturing a response; because we moved to Maine, to reach out to a different lifestyle. To get away from our previous box. To start fresh.
Maine is a great place for fresh starts. For new adventures.
I hope you don't mind if I say God Bless You. Your response was definitely from a "knowing" place; it's absolutely amazing how estate/probate troubles destroy whatever was left of families. It's beyond comprehension. Everything you describe about your siblings is identical to mine. They preferred basically to destroy a homestead built by our father over forty years' time rather than do the most minimal things to save it. A house divided against itself really can't stand, I guess.
Anyhoo... Your closing is a great thing to read before I log off. I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but am I ever glad I found City Data. I joined in 2008 but avoided it because it's so graphic minimal. Now it's, like, a forum for our entire country.
I grew up in New England (mostly) and after high school in Ohio and college in Indiana, I returned to NE (my parents had also moved back after time away in Ohio and NY.... first to RI and then to Maine). I raised my family in RI and NH and after a divorce and retirement....I moved to California....to "start fresh". I stayed out there for about 3-4 years.....finished "coming out" process and then my partner and I moved to Maine. We are both older than you are....and altho we really loved maine.....we found the winters to be very limiting. We were fearful on the roads....and my partners avocation (tennis) was really seasonal or had to be pursued indoors. So after buying a lovely home and putting in extensive gardens....(my avocation) we decided to move to Florida.
So from my experience......the move to California to start anew....was only fulfilled by my meeting my partner. Our move to Maine was almost everything we wanted.....except I had forgotten how cold and icy winters could be (reality test).....and we found it hard to keep smilin' as we realized this wasn't the spot just right. (at least not for us).
Now we are just over a year in Florida (Gulf Coast)....and it feels right. I hope it is because I don't intend to move again.
My situation doesn't parallel yours exactly but it does include several moves attempting to get a fresh start. None of them have been a disaster.....but California and a return to northern NE didn't work out for me. I am enjoying FL even tho I really miss New England. (not winter).
You are going to be moving on your own......that makes it harder. If I were you I would be thinking of southern Maine....a larger demographic.....more possible activities and friendship potential. In your grief process.....I wouldn't recommend isolating yourself and cutting off social possibilities. Maine has one of the highest suicide rates in the nation; and alcohol abuse and domestic violence.......(I think I am correct on the last two....if not I apologize).....isolation, long winters, and poor economic prospects are probably contributing factors.
Moving and getting a fresh start are attractive and realizable......but remember.....no matter where you go .... there you are. That includes the fractured family, the losses and the hurts.
I wish you tremendous good luck and success and happiness. (By the way....As a gay man......I think your comment about your movers was just precious and adorable. Thanks)
My remaining parent died in the spring of 2012. I remained in my hometown for the greater part of my life, particularly in my parents' old age, for the sake of being near family. Although I have siblings all alive, they either do not live in the hometown (PA), or there has been an estrangement that can't be overcome. As soon as all efforts at overcoming the estrangement became clear to me, I began to be interested in "leaving."
in the past year-and-a-half, three "sure" moves, first to Oxford County, then to Penobscot, and most recently, to Franklin, have fallen apart for different reasons at the last moment. So as painful as it is to ask this online, I need to determine whether grief not only for being "orphaned" is insidiously responsible for my desire to relocate, but if on-going grief over siblings waging sad wars is even more of a motivation.
I'd appreciate responses from anyone who has come to Maine not only as a way of growing toward a new life but as a way of escaping an old one. My boxes are packed, my movers are the kindest guys in the world (I want them to move me to Maine specifically so they can legally marry), and it's not as if I'm sitting here in my easy chair thinking of things that would be nice to do in the sweet bye-and-bye. I'm a mass of nerves and conflicting impulses, and my hard drive and Inbox are choked with emails to and from prospective landlords. (I am not in a financial position to purchase a home.) People talk about the stress of moving, but I think the greatest stress of all is the gearing-up period before the move has even incarnated in the form of cardboard boxes and strapping tape, because one still is in the "old world," and the pull of the old world on the heart...can probably bring about coronaries.
It would be an act of kindness particularly from folk in my demographic (55+) to hear that grief was a reason to leave a former home state where one has spent the greater part of one's life.
Yikes, this is all very complicated (duh). How many stressful situations can be piled onto one person, all at the same time? Moving alone can be enough to fry quite a few brain cells. And I don't think it's necessarily wrong to move b/c of grief.
But, practical stuff: how have the three "sure" moves, all fallen apart for different reasons at the last moment? Are you going to Maine, & looking at rentals, writing out deposit checks, & signing leases? Or just getting email agreements?
I dunno. Moving alone won't take away grief, or remove psychic residue from A-hole relatives. (If you figure out how to do that last part, pls. let me know). OTOH.....I say do it; if you can get the practical stuff worked out for the move, like an actual rental you can move into......
I am in your age demographic. I want to move back to New England because I miss my siblings. We shared the care of our father, who had early onset Alzheimer's, for 20 years. We are close and they don't travel.
I live in Florida and love my job, but when I retire I won't have loved ones here. My best friend down here committed suicide in 2004 and somehow Fl's not a friendly place without him.
My difficulty will be coping with the Maine winter, but I will probably just hole up then, as I do here in Florida in the summer. I really dislike the heat and am trying to avoid a recurrence of a serious skin cancer. Give me winter even if I am a timid driver!
If you do move, join the Y or a church or social group: have some network as you're fleeing a toxic family situation. You'll need a support group.
I have a wonderful sister who lives in Maine and I think she knows everyone in her town, and every sullen teenager that we pass on the street just lights up when she goes by, goes up to her and hugs her b/c she is a beloved teacher there. She has told me that Maine has really good community spirit, just exceptional. She is in the Boothbays area.
Elston and Woody, man, you both were the supplements to Submariner. First, Elston, thanks for the reality-check from a former area native. I couldn't be lured to Florida for love or money, but it's interesting that the "opposite" of Maine worked for you. Sort of like George Costanza, doing "the opposite."
I feel like writing about why all three rentals fell through and expect no one to read this. I just feel like it, because at least for me it proves how strange people can be and how hard it is to find decent...circumstances. All three fell through for different reasons, all arranged online, with background and financial checks after my first checking the landlords out.
The first, in Oxford County, fell through when a guy I finally referred to as SuperMainer kept calling me and telling me how much I would love Maine. His accent was straight from central casting, and he would keep me on the phone talking about the state, which at first was rather charming. He claimed (and I confirmed) that he checked all my references. So I gave my landlord, with whom I get on very well, thirty days' notice.
The guy kept calling after all the gears were in motion, and his "Maine-ish-ness" started taking on a different aspect. He started warning me about things I might not like about the state. I thought it was nice of him to do all this and that maybe he was just lonely. Finally, I asked him why he was offering quite so many warnings, and he claimed my landlord gave me a negative reference. This was so beyond belief, I didn't need to call my landlord (although I did, and as expected, my landlord stated the obvious--that if he had given a negative reference, why would the guy rent to me?). I still don't know what the heck this whole episode was about, but it ended with me staying put.
The second failure this past August was part act-of-God and part my own aging. I started out on the nine-hour drive with back troubles I wrote off as part of my depression. A third of the way to Maine--sorry, all Connecticut and Massachusetts folk--but y'all are the wickedest interstate drivers in the country--me and a gazillion others came to a grinding, hours-long I-84 standstill. The back pain was unbearable; I pulled off, got a hotel, and the next day sped back to PA. A MRI said I have not one but two curvatures of the spine. The poor landlord up in Dexter was an angel and asked if I wanted him to hold the rental for me, but I was too frightened from the diagnosis. So that ended sadly.
But the latest, this past month, was downright wicked. I never finished my education and thought I should shoot for an academic town. I found a rental that seemed so too-good-to-be-true I was sure it was a scam, but I called anyway. The landlady said immediately that an "older person" was what she wanted, because "all the young girls" who contacted her would "bring men home" and "what-not." I offered her references; she said she went with her gut. I offered her Maine contacts; she said Not Necessary. In less than two hours after that exhilarating phone call, I gave away at least two hundred dollars' worth of belongings on the Free regional Craigslist and was scheduled to move four days hence. She of course had given me her real name.
The next afternoon, working non-stop to clean my apartment and regretting the hit my wallet would take over paying rent to two landlords in two different states, my phone rings. This woman whose "gut" told her I "was the one" asks, "Why do you want to move to Maine?"
I was like, Uh, we discussed this yesterday. She's in her late 60's, and so I thought maybe she's...hormonal? Forgetful? I repeated everything I told her the day before, and then she said she was leaving town! She told me to come and move in, leave well over a thousand dollars in her mailbox, and that I would find keys to the apartment. This was so off the wall that I started wondering if some very good con artist had assumed an identity that, it turned out, is strongly ensconced in the professional community in the town.
With my movers planning to give up one of the prettiest autumn weekends in the Northeast for me, I phoned this lady the following morning, but the calls went straight to voice mail. I texted her. I emailed her. No response at all, none the day after. So I tracked her down at her professional office two days before I was out the door, sure by that point someone had stolen her identity and the whole thing was a scam. But nope, she answered like a cornered five-year-old, Oh, are you still coming?
I wanted to say, Oh, sure, and I'll be wearing a tin-foil hat like the one you clearly are.
So that's the story. The first and last rentals were Craigslist, the second wasn't. I had no qualms using Craigslist because my present, very satisfactory rental was from there, and a lot of realtors use it to get exposure for clients' properties. I think my Craigslist days are over.
Thanks for letting me vent! And thank you all again for the priceless insights and wisdom. Have a wonderful night.
I think Maine is a pretty darned good place for healing. Just my two cents.
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), and it's not as if I'm sitting here in my easy chair thinking of things that would be nice to do in the sweet bye-and-bye. I'm a mass of nerves and conflicting impulses, and my hard drive and Inbox are choked with emails to and from prospective landlords. (I am not in a financial position to purchase a home.) People talk about the stress of moving, but I think the greatest stress of all is the gearing-up period before the move has even incarnated in the form of cardboard boxes and strapping tape, because one still is in the "old world," and the pull of the old world on the heart...can probably bring about coronaries.
, doing "the opposite." 
. 
