Leaving the Pacific Northwest

Dakota and I have made the decision to leave the Pacific Northwest.

That sentence has been sitting with us for a while now. Not as an impulse, not as a reaction, but as a quiet conclusion reached after years of paying attention. This place has been beautiful to us in many ways. It has also asked more than it has given, and that imbalance has finally become impossible to ignore.

One of the hardest things to name is the loneliness.

People talk about the Seattle Freeze as if it’s a quirky regional trait—an inside joke, a cultural shrug. But lived over time, it isn’t quirky. It’s wearing. We’ve found ourselves active, engaged, curious, and open, yet somehow untethered. Conversations happen easily enough. Moments sparkle. There are kind faces, shared laughs, brief connections that feel promising. And then—nothing. No follow-up. No weaving into anything lasting. The thread just… stops.

Over and over again.

It’s not that we haven’t met good people. We have. Truly wonderful ones, in fact. Random gems. A shared coffee, a meaningful exchange, a night where it feels like something might finally take root. But for reasons we still can’t quite name—timing, distance, full lives, unspoken walls—those connections don’t deepen. They don’t become community. They don’t turn into the kind of relationships that show up when things are hard, or even when things are just ordinary.

And the absence of a support system takes a toll, even when you’re strong. Especially when you’re strong.

Being capable, independent, and resilient doesn’t mean you’re meant to do everything alone. There’s an emotional cost to being active in the world while having no real net beneath you. No one to call when something goes sideways. No familiar kitchen table to land at. No shared history to soften the sharp edges of life.

That cost adds up quietly, the way fatigue does. You don’t notice it at first. Then one day you realize you’re tired in a way rest doesn’t fix.

What makes that absence more pronounced is the distance from my family. From my mom. From Gracelynn.

Being far away has meant missing the ordinary moments—the ones that don’t get planned far in advance or marked on a calendar. It’s meant phone and video calls instead of sitting side by side, updates instead of shared days, and watching a child grow through stories and pictures rather than presence. I feel that distance in my body, not just in my thoughts. I want to see her light up when I say "Hi Bestie" in person. Not just through a screen. 

My mom is getting older. Gracelynn is growing faster than time seems willing to admit. And I’ve reached a point in my life where proximity matters more than possibility. I want to be close enough to show up without arranging it weeks or months ahead of time. Close enough that love can be practical. Close enough that care can be immediate.

Family, for me, isn’t an abstract value. It’s a lived one. And being this far away has required a kind of emotional stretching that no longer feels sustainable.

At the same time, our hearts have been tugging eastward—toward family, toward roots, toward a sense of being known. I want to be closer to my family. I want to be closer to Gracelynn. Not in a “we’ll visit when we can” way, but in the way that allows for presence. The kind where milestones aren’t scheduled events but ordinary moments. The kind where love shows up on a Tuesday, unannounced.

Some of the most meaningful connections in my life are tied to Oregon. Not to a city or an address, but to a sense of steadiness I’ve come to recognize as rooted rather than temporary. There are people there who have known me in ways that don’t require constant tending, and that kind of knowing leaves a mark.

What I’m learning is that roots and location aren’t always the same thing. You can live somewhere beautiful and still feel unmoored. You can also carry a sense of belonging that isn’t dependent on where you wake up each morning. Oregon has held pieces of my story that remain intact, regardless of distance, and acknowledging that has helped clarify what I need now.

Moving closer to my center doesn’t mean severing those ties. It means understanding which connections are strong enough to remain without proximity, and which environments allow me to stay grounded enough to honor them. Some roots are deep enough to hold even when you’re not standing directly above them.

That matters more to me now than novelty, scenery, or proximity to mountains and water—no matter how stunning they are.

This decision isn’t about failure. It isn’t about not trying hard enough. It isn’t even about the Pacific Northwest being “bad.” It’s about recognizing when a place no longer fits the life you’re trying to live. When the effort required to stay outweighs the nourishment you receive.

We are leaving because we want to belong somewhere again.

We want community that grows slowly but sticks. We want friendships that don’t dissolve after one good conversation. We want to be woven into something—imperfect, human, sometimes messy—but real.

There is grief in this choice. Of course there is. You don’t leave a chapter without acknowledging what it held. But there is also relief. A loosening. A sense of honesty.

Sometimes clarity doesn’t arrive as a lightning bolt. Sometimes it arrives as a quiet knowing that repeats itself until you finally listen.

This is us listening.

Just to be clear, we’re not packing boxes tomorrow. This isn’t a sudden exit or a dramatic goodbye. We’re taking our time and being thoughtful about what comes next. Right now, that looks like quietly looking for work back east and seeing what opportunities make sense before anything else moves.

This is the slow part. The planning part. The part where you make sure you’re landing on your feet and not just leaping. When it’s time to share more, we will. For now, we just wanted you to know that this is a considered decision, made with care.