Deciding to leave a place where you live is a little like a break-up. First you notice you’re just not that happy. But you keep it inside your head. Then you start to name the things wrong with your partner. You start with the small stuff. That’s easier. Like the fact there is no public transportation. And it’s not very walkable or bike-able. And then there’s the looong summers. And don’t get me started on the tornadoes. But then you realize it’s not just in the small ways, but in many big ways, you’re just not in a good relationship. You’re living in a state that is banning books and drag shows, but loosening up rules about who can tote a gun around. Tennessee, how about you stay in your lane and fix the giant potholes on the interstates instead of telling women, and parents of teenagers, which medical procedures they can access? And once you start to name the ways this relationship just isn’t working anymore, there’s no going back. It’s time to move on. So what’s a 60-something year old couple to do? Do you really want to pack up all your stuff again? Do you start to question the meaning of life? I promise you this song will help you put your problems into perspective.

O.K after questioning the meaning of life, you move onto brass tacks. Developing an exit strategy. Step #1 is to start to tell people you are moving on. Hence this blog. So far, Step #1 is about all we’ve done, but hey it’s a start. This might be the blankest slate we have ever started with when it comes to options. At most of those major stop signs in life, your choice of where to go is dictated by someone else. You start your life where your parents decided to plunk themselves down. Then if college or grad school calls, you just go there. Then you move for your first job. If you’re lucky enough to work for a Dutch company, you might live in Amsterdam for 5 years. How do you figure out where to go when there is no one telling you where to go? What you need is a relocation matchmaker, someone who figures out the perfect match for you.

Time for me to tell my N.J./N.Y.C. friends about a production of Fiddler now playing at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn. You can watch Rachel’s dear friend Austen and my guitar teacher Ellie’s girlfriend Maya star as Hodel and Chava. L’chaim!

With no direction in mind, and no Matchmaker in sight, you just listen to your daughter and say yes to Boston. Problem solved. After so many years of living out of suitcases when we see each other, it will be so so nice to be nearby.

We have our most moved and re-moved friend Vera to thank for finally making the decision to move to Boston. Vera has lived in (and moved from) Amsterdam, Paris, Munich, Hong Kong, Johannesburg, Dubai, etc. etc. So she knows a thing or two about moving. And she said all you need in your new place is a family member and a few friends and you figure out the rest once you get there. She assured us that we will build the our community when we are settled. We’re trusting you on this, Vera.

Next item on the agenda is to start to reminisce about the things you’ll miss, while simultaneously compiling lists of rants about the place you are leaving. It’s a tough juggling act. But I do my best.

Here’s the view from our dining room table. And um, I beg to differ with the trash collection team. I spend quite a bit of time these days in the trashing-Tennessee business.

It’s not like I won’t miss anything about this place. We love our house, although neither of us expected to even date a modern house with zero charm. And we’ll miss our wonderful neighbors who have been truly the best thing about Nashville. Before we moved in, back in 2019, they took care of everything from letting painters into our house, to being there when mattresses were delivered- without ever having met me - when Peter was in the hospital. I will always be grateful to them.

And those rolling hills. I’ll miss those. We finally made it to the Smoky Mountains in October for Ben’s 30th birthday gift from us. We were there just at the start of the changing colors, so it was especially pretty. And the crowds were manageable. Ben was treated like a celebrity by fans pointing at him in awe at the top of some major climbs. He was the only cyclist around.

The photo just above was not taken in the Smokies. It’s from a trip to a state park just a 20 minute drive from our house. A place we like to visit and to take visitors to see. There is a certain excitement people feel about coming to visit Nashville. Even my sister and her husband, whose 8 p.m. bedtime interferes with their ability to paint the town pink alongside the bachelorettes, were thrilled to finally get here and we were thrilled to have them. Will any of you feel the same excitement about coming to Boston?

Time for a song. In Four Years of Chances, Margo Price tells us she is finally giving up on her husband or boyfriend after giving him four years of chances. Appropriate, since that’s exactly the number of years we have given to this relationship with Nashville.

“And now I'm going to say it slowly
Before I go away
You had me one thousand, four hundred sixty-one days.”

If I trust Margo Price’s math, my four years in Nashville amounts to one thousand, four hundred sixty-one days. Plenty of time to decide things just aren’t working out, my dear.

Am I the only one who hears this iconic movie theme from Shaft in the opening bars of Margo Price’s Four More Years? No matter if you do or don’t, this gives me the chance to re-listen to this gem. I can’t explain to you why my 11-year-old self loved this song so much.

I’ll miss the murals here, especially the ones of musicians in the Berry Hill neighborhood. I was so happy to find Joni Mitchell standing right next to Otis Redding. Two of my heroes.

I’ll miss the tiny mini-murals in tucked-away parts of town.

While this prayer display may be charming looking at first glance, it seems strange to me. I won’t miss people parading their religion around. Or maybe they do that in Boston? Good lord, I hope not.

I’ll miss the coffee shops with lots of sun streaming in. Something tells me I’ll find plenty of coffee shops in Boston. Maybe not with so much room to spread out and so much sun pouring in? I’ll deal with it.

I understand why Tracy Chapman says, “Give me one reason to stay here and I’ll turn right back around.” But that’s not going to happen in my case, no matter what Nashville says to me. Also, I notice in the song that no one ever does give her that one reason.

Not going to miss these all-too-frequent tornado warnings on my phone.

Unlike Lucinda Williams in this next song, I don’t think I’m going to have such a hard time letting go. We’ll see when the time comes to actually pack up the car and pull out of the driveway. I love how her voice gets progressively gravelly at the end.

“I'm like a fish out of water, a cat in a tree
You don't even want to talk to me
Well, it's over, I know it but I can't let go.”

I’m going to slip in the link to one of my favorite articles of the year, which happens to be about Lucinda Williams, but also about Louisiana, and the writer’s mother, and about music. And it contains this gem: “The songs we hear as children end up being a lot like our fathers; we go on hearing them in our heads even when they’re not around.”

“Hey, I wish you'd want me to stay

I'll be alright
Just not tonight

But someday.

Say goodbye to me

I won't say I'm sorry
I'll be alright

Once I find the other side of someday.”

Nashville, I’m looking forward to finding the other side of someday.

Not relevant to our move (nor really to anything), but seeing Sara Bareilles serenade us in the grocery store in the video reminded me of an important thought I’d love to share with you. A few months ago, while visiting our mom in N.J., my sister and I stopped off at the local Shoprite. And when some music came on, we both immediately began to dance. As one does in a grocery store, of course. It turns out both of us have spent our fair share of time bursting into dance while walking up and down the grocery aisles. And embarrassing our children and anyone else watching in the process. But, hear me out, what if grocery stores played particular music at particular times to attract customers so that my sister and I weren’t dancing alone? Motown from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. for the retirees, a kids’-hour after naptime, some boygenius for the 20-somethings at 7 p.m.? We’re still fine- tuning the idea and figuring out how to turn it into a multi-million dollar enterprise for the two of us. Stay tuned on that. Consider yourselves lucky to be let in on the ground floor of this booty-shaking idea.

I’ll miss all the *Little Free Libraries* close to our neighborhood. This was one of my faves, hand-painted with a scene from one of my favorite books of all time. Is that old house in Paris available for purchase?

I will miss the way music pops up in so many crevasses here, like in this little coffee place just outside of Nashville.

I guess I have to thank you, Nashville, for getting me back into playing music. I mean, how can you live in a place nicknamed Music City and not feel like you have to play your part? And then came the pandemic, so I started in with guitar and violin lessons with Ellie and Rili. They are two supremely talented musical superheroes who have taught me to silence the voice in my head telling me I’m too old for this and listen to the voice telling me to keep trying. After two years of lessons on my iPad screen, we finally met up in person in November in Brooklyn. It was like seeing my kindergarten teacher in a grocery store - that staggering frozen sense you got, as if you were face to face with a celebrity - except if my kindergarten teacher were way younger and waaaay cooler.

Also on the What I’ll Miss/Things to Thank Nashville For List: the Farmer’s Market, where we met some of our closest “friends”. The spice lady, the bread gals, the micro greens guy. These are the people who know which pie I’ll wait in line for. In other words, the really meaningful things about me.

I’ll miss some of the funky decorations I see when I’m out walking. How did this homeowner know that Pokey was one of my best friends when I was a kid? It was great to see him out and about, protecting Gumby from the cacti.

Is it too much to ask that I want to live in a place with lots of people who share my world view, good public transportation, decent weather, delicious food, lots of coffee, bike lanes, excellent healthcare, and places to hear and play music? Have I set my sights too high?

Start to picture yourself in your new city, they say. So I did some searching and found a place in Cambridge that serves fried chicken and bluegrass music jams for advanced-beginners like me. Oddly enough, there is no place like this in Nashville. Also, one description of a band that headlined there read, “Eugene Tyler Band are just three mama’s boys with anxiety problems trying to find catharsis in high-energy, irreverent songs.” These are my kind of people.

Apropos of nothing, here’s the photographic evidence that I met James Taylor last summer at the Newport Folk Festival. Since I haven’t written a blog in so long, I realized I never got the chance to show this prize winner off. Add this to the list of reasons to move: to make it easier for JT and me to get together to play the guitar and catch up on our lives.

I’m guessing Elizabeth Warren is also excited about our move and the chance to spend a lot more time with me.

O.K. Enough about Nashville. At least I have plenty of break-up songs to listen to as we pack up and head out. I can imagine some of you are now saying to yourselves, “What’s the big deal? Just pack up and go.” Easy for you to say. I think moving is a lot like childbirth. Painful when you are going through it yourself, but as soon as it’s over, you bury all that pain. And when it’s the next person’s turn, you think, “It’s not so bad.” Can we all agree figuring out where to plunk yourself down, then putting all your worldly possessions in boxes and carting them to this new place is no fun? Thank you. Yet if it were that bad, we’d all miss out on a lot. Fear of moving would have meant no Amsterdam. And not leaving Nashville. It’s never too late in life to find yourself a better place to rest your head.

It’s hard to explain why my 16-year-old self loved this next song so much. So I won’t even try. But I’ll just say it’s a great break-up song, and a fitting ending to my ramblings. Guess I’ll also have to change the name of this blog. Procrastination is one of my super powers, so let me dwell on that instead of what’s really important (like finding a house). But now that I’ve told you about the break-up, we have to go, don’t we? As Boz Scaggs said, “It’s too late to turn back now.”