You're not alone if you ever dream of a fresh start in the country. Hear what it resembles from 3 families who really made the leap.
Who hasn't imagined dropping city life and moving to the country? Possibly you have actually spent weekend trips skimming the regional realty listings, baffled by how far a dollar can extend: A farmhouse (with acreage!) for what a walkup studio would cost in the city?
In 2012, I made the jump, moving from Seattle to a small summer town in Maine. I began photographing these people and interviewing them about their accomplishments and difficulties in transitioning to country living. The job took flight right away-- clearly I wasn't the only one believing about leaving the city.
Do not take it from me, though. Hear it from these 3 families who left the city behind for a clean slate.
Photography by Alissa Hessler. You can find out more profiles like these on Urban Exodus and in her book Ditch the City and Go Country.
Kenzie and Shawn Fields
When a family of New Yorkers discovered a wacky house in the Berkshires at a third the expense of their city cage, they figured it was fate.
Moved from: New York City City, pop. 8.5 million
Kenzie and Shawn Fields were living in what most New York families would consider a dream situation-- a three-bedroom coop home in a preferable Brooklyn area. To manage living in the city, however, both Kenzie and Shawn had to work long hours.
When Kenzie's moms and dads transferred to the Berkshires, an innovative hub in the mountains of Massachusetts, the Fields household came for a check out and began dreaming of leaving the city behind. The couple wanted to offer their kids a childhood immersed in nature and access to excellent public schools. "It seemed like an inspired idea," remembers Shawn. "However when I believed about all the worries and unknowns, logically it was a bad concept given that what we had in the city was truly fantastic." When they stumbled across their storybook 1756 home while casually taking a look at property listings, however, they felt that fate was pushing their hand. "On what I believed was a lark, we looked at a home in a town with a great little school," states Shawn. "The mortgage on the home was about a third of our home's home loan. That see sealed the deal."
Moved to: New Marlborough, Mass., pop. 1,509
Shawn and Kenzie took a leap of faith and moved their family to New Marlborough. "Living in a town in the nation was a great answer for us," states Kenzie. "We're actions from a post workplace, library, vehicle mechanic and a general shop. We live throughout from a hurrying creek, which is soothing. There's no deafening rural silence. Rural does not have to mean empty and large."
Instead of continuing to strive to even more the professions of other artists, the couple chose to focus their efforts on structure Shawn's fine-art service. Providing up their consistent city incomes while taking on the expenses of winter season heating and caring for an old house hasn't been a cinch, but they can't picture going back to the confined confines of city living.
Entering their home is like strolling into among Shawn's narrative paintings. On a typical day, their child, Honey, might greet you in the lawn with a pet rabbit, their son Peter might follow you around with his brass trumpet, and their other son Odie may provide to perform a magic trick. They have gotten crafty-- repurposing wood, windows and thrifted treasures to change their cottage into a cozy, wacky wonderland.
The kids have much more freedom to check out now-- they spend hours playing in the creek by their home and volunteering at the library down the street. And they have actually all discovered, states Kenzie, that "the opportunity to care is more present when you run out the overwhelming scale of a city. When my mother passed away, people we didn't understand well left whole meals on our patio."
They like the natural setting of their brand-new life, states Kenzie. "Playing charades with our next-door neighbors, heating with wood, the animals, library pie sales, town hall meetings.
Richard Blanco
A Cuban-American poet found the quiet he needs to write-- plus a sense of belonging-- in a tiny Maine town.
Moved from: San Antonio, Texas
At President Obama's second inauguration in 2013, Richard Blanco's reading of his poem One Today influenced the nation. What many people do not understand is that, looking back, he's uncertain he would have been able to write the visit poem if he hadn't been confined to his writing desk, surrounded by pine forests stacked high with snow, up on a mountainside in his new house in St Louis, Missouri.
Before relocating to Maine, Richard lived the majority of his life in San Antonio. In 2012, he was working as a civil engineer and composing in his extra time when his partner, Mark, got a task that required the couple to relocate to the small ski town of St Louis, Missouri. Richard was a little worried at first, he was excited at the possibility of leaving the traffic and noise of city life and having the opportunity to compose more.
And he now recognizes that living in the nation was a natural for him. "I believe I've always desired to move to the nation," he says. Most of my household is from rural locations in Cuba, and I felt extremely at house there."
Relocated to: St Louis, Missouri
Richard and Mark didn't understand how this village would get them, but they have been happily surprised. St Louis has actually welcomed "the gay couple from San Antonio," as they were referred to for a while, with open arms. Richard is a reputable member of the community and-- since the inauguration-- a town celeb.
"After that honeymoon phase, the very first thing that started to prod on me was having to drive everywhere," states Richard. He also misses out on the anonymity of city life: "There is no such thing as simply a waiter in St Louis. You know their entire life, and you understand their children, where they grew up ... and they know everything about you.
In the house, he and Mark have actually built a private sanctuary, total with bridges, ponds and streams, with their own hands. However there was a knowing curve. "After a year of fighting the components, I had to make decisions about where to stop landscaping and let nature take over," says Richard. "I got a little brought away and made these mounds of work for myself and ended up not enjoying what I originally came here for. I needed to take an action back and be fine with letting things just grow in."
After moving to the country, Richard more info here at first continued to work from another location on agreement engineering tasks, but the cheaper expense of living in Maine enabled him to shift focus and prioritize his poetry. And given that 2013, he's been able to work nearly entirely as an author, leaving his engineering career behind.
He offers the location where he lives a lot of credit for all this. Life in the nation has actually given him area and time to focus on his writing. And perhaps more importantly, it has finally offered him a place that seems like home.
Joe and Ashley Duggers
A surprise company challenge turned these Silicon Valley business owners into a family of rural ranchers.
Moved from: Sacramento, California
A few years earlier, Joe and Ashley Duggers ran and owned 11 businesses in the Silicon Valley city of Sacramento: a finding out center, a maker area, a flower designer store and a play area for toddlers, just among others. All this in addition to raising 4 women under the age of 6. They appreciated their busy, complete lives however worried that the affluence of Silicon Valley would provide their children a manipulated perspective on the world.
This led them to a new potential venture-- running a livestock cattle ranch that might supply meat to their dining establishment. The property had 2 homes, one a historic Victorian in desperate requirement of repair work and one a comfortable two-bedroom cabin. They leapt in and bought the residential or commercial property in 2013, hoping to one day find a method to move to the cattle ranch full time.
Transferred to: Fort Jones, California, pop. 688
The Duggers' original strategy was to work with ranchers to run business. Joe and Ashley would drive up on weekends so the ladies could hang out running free in the outdoors. "We always had a desire to raise our kids in large open spaces in a more rural community," states Ashley. "Joe grew up on a farm and hoped we 'd get back to the land sooner or later. After coming up every weekend for a number of months and discovering a gem of a community here, we quickly chose this was where we wished to raise our children. We sold our services and went up the day our oldest daughter completed kindergarten and have actually been all-in ever given that."
After four years of effort, the Duggers have built a successful pasture-raised meat business. They sell their items online, in their historical brick-and-mortar store in Fort Jones and at pop-up markets in Sacramento when they return to go to. Searching for more ways to earn a living off the land, this year they released 5 Ashley Retreats, where they host ladies at their hillside ranch camp for a weekend of farm tasks and cooking classes. This January, they're opening a dining establishment in Fort Jones.
There are no weekends or holidays off, however they invest far more time together as a family now, working alongside one another. The Duggers do not have the benefits, clean clothing or downtime they had in their previous life, and have actually needed to become more self-sufficient: "In the city, I could get anything done at the drop of a hat," states Ashley. "But in the nation, I've needed to adjust my expectations. Whatever moves a little more gradually, however surviving on a cattle ranch implies you can construct anything you can imagine yourself, which is more gratifying than hiring someone to do it."
Another reward is seeing their women turn into brave, hardworking and independent free-range women. "My girls' favorite slogan is 'where there is a will, there's a method,' and all of us need to push difficult to make it all occur!" says Ashley. At the end of a long day, when the animals are fed, Ashley and Joe love to blend a mixed drink, put a 5 Ashley roast in the oven and sit on their front porch to watch their children run complimentary in the lawn.