We have been a busy pair of twins lately, it seems we are competing for the most change in our lives. This summer Darcy unexpectedly moved her family out to Astoria, Oregon and I finalized my divorce after a 9 year marriage, and 23 year relationship. Big changes in our lives.
Moving and divorce both clearly have significant impacts on a family’s finances, so we will be sharing a series of post about the lessons we’ve learned along the way. First, a bit of the backstory.
Darcy will undoubtedly share in more detail about her move and new home, but I will start telling the story of how the Cronins made their way out to the land of the Goonies. Their family had already been planning and preparing to move within Portland, though they had initially been looking at the Irvington neighborhood in NE. In the incredibly hot Portland real estate market, this was a pretty big leap of faith. In crunching the numbers, it looked like there was about $100k gap from what they wanted, and what reality could afford. Nevertheless, they continued to plow ahead, with faith that they would land in their next dream home. Little did they know that it would be in Astoria, at a fraction of the price of what their new home would cost in Portland. All this happened in three months flat.
I took a similar leap of faith last year at this time, moving from Washington, DC to Oregon with a newborn and the possibility of a new dream job. I landed (what appeared to be) my dream job, and closed on my new home on the same day. Meanwhile, it was evident from before the move (but truthfully long before then), that my marriage to my high school sweetheart was on the rocks. Despite having a long history and several business partnerships, we had lived much of our relationship apart from each other and did not have the same dreams in life.
Luckily we were able to agree quickly on the terms of our divorce and the division of assets. Things have been amicable throughout, though divorce is never easy. Meanwhile, my thought-to-be dream job was causing more stress than my workaholic career in DC and abroad ever had. Suffice to say that being micromanaged at a small nonprofit, after having successfully managed millions of dollars and hundreds of staff in the most difficult places on earth, was not my cup of tea. On what would have been my 9th wedding anniversary, I opted to step down from my job and could not be happier than to have moved on from both. Since then, the whirlwind has continued, as I manifested my dream partner Adam and have been pursuing various entrepreneurial endeavors. I look forward to sharing more with readers along the journey.
Cheers,
Miel
