The year began with lunch.  And a walk, during which we discussed what we REALLY want to do now that we are retired.  There were further discussions, more walks, some glasses of wine, some more glasses of wine, and a test balloon of an idea at the end: Maybe we could move to Providence RI.  

We know Providence well; Jeff grew up in the area and his extended family is mostly there, we both went to Brown, and our beloved daughter Sophie lives on the East Side and works in Cranston.  (Our beloved son Jeffrey and his adorable girlfriend Jenny will probably move around a bit before they settle, so they dodged the parents-moving-to-their-town bullet.)  We love visiting Providence because it is fun, friendly, colorful, quirky, artsy and hip, with residents who are engaged and involved in their communities.  The surrounding area has abundant natural beauty, with the state of RI claiming over 400 miles of coastline.  As an added bonus, Boston is easily accessible by inexpensive daily commuter rail service.

However, it might be crazy for us to move to Providence because:

1. It’s colder there in the winter than where we live now, Bethlehem PA.
2. We’d like to live on the East Side, which means we’d have to buy an old house.
3. That old house that we would buy would probably not offer one-level living (at least, not in our price range!)
4. It’s colder there in the winter and sometimes they get a lot of snow.
5. They have a car tax. Ok, that reason is a bit petty, but a car tax is annoying!
6. Did I mention that the winters are COLD in Providence?

Taking all of the above pros and cons into consideration, we made a trip in April to do some exploratory house hunting, purely for investigational purposes of course, to get a better feel for the market, see what kinds of homes were available in our price range, start the process, etc.  And that weekend WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!  and IT’S OLD!!  and IT HAS STAIRS!!!  But it is also lovely, charming and filled with sunlight, has a pretty little back yard, and is within walking distance of all sorts of things that we like to do.

We rushed back home to Bethlehem and worked hard for several weeks getting our house ready to sell.  It sold four days after we listed it!  We are grateful to our friend and realtor Barbara Fraust and to the staff of Carol C. Dorey Real Estate, Inc. for their excellent advice and service.  Here’s a picture of our house in Bethlehem:

Things are happening fast.  We will move in July, and begin our new adventure.