I am cheating on Austin. A love affair with two cities.

A  question I have been asked over the years from many people when in the depths of a relationship talk is "can you love more than one person at one time" like love..love. I have always believed in the enormous capacity of love, I have been known to say that I fall in love with everything around me. EveryTHING that is not everyone. I finally figured out...that I am telling myself I have that capacity to be positive about unfavorable places I have ended up or circumstances of my decisions in the past that landed me in an uncomfortable life position. It is possible to love many people, to be IN LOVE with a person is much more limited once you really give your entire focus to that person. To clarify I don't believe that someone can truly be in love with more than one person at a time. I have known this for a while now but so much of a relationship can be the place where that relationship exists, if both people in the relationship are driven by the environment in which they live. For me, making the decision to leave a place I loved and vowed to never leave, for a person I love even more was easy. The process of saying farewell to Ausitn was gut wrenching. But I have arrived, and my heart is in Portland physically, but now here is the issue. EVERYWHERE I GO people draw comparisons to Austin, so it is kind of like running into an ex over and over. So, I have embraced the concept that I CAN LOVE MORE THAN ONE CITY!!! Thus the birth of my blog Texlandia.

I will have to start with some "back file conversion" on my last 6 months in Portland and the next several posts will consist of August through now. I've been meaning to get this thing started as I find myself in a hilarious social experiment with starting over socially and professionally in possibly the quirkiest place I could have ended up.

Shortly after making the decision to move out here someone wrote on my fb wall, "wait, people leave Austin?" and here I often get that starry eyed look from local Portlanders "ohhh you're from Austin?! I've been trying to get a job so I can save money to move there", or "Why would you come here from there", or "Oh I hear Austin and Portland are a lot alike". Because of my obsession with Austin Texas, seriously I was obsessed with my life there I agreed with these statements and sometimes felt sorry for myself. Like this article for example, http://austin.culturemap.com/newsdetail/07-01-11-00-20-austins-best-of-best-of-list/. Then I would look around at this beautiful place or right behind me at the gorgeous view from my living room and and wonder, "do they not see what I see?"  To me, right now the only true commonality I have found between the two cities is that they are both amazing places to live and to have the love of my life Matt and my rad dog Hanz to share my days with. Oh, and they both have awesome food carts. For now I am two timing like a seventh grader, and I have chosen to be in love with both of them at the same time.

Maybe through this adventure of starting over in a new place from scratch at 30 years old, I will get to the bottom of all of the comparisons to find out which city will reign superior in my heart. Maybe I won't and It will just be babble from a room with a view..eitherway I hope you enjoy.

Much Love