Southern Life

It's been about six weeks since we moved to Roswell. It's been...challenging, for one. We're still having issues (especially about the robbery) that we're trying to work through, but overall life has been very good. Grad school is busy, Chloe is busy, Becky is busy, and we're enjoying it. However, it's been different. I think I have had enough experience to give a little bit of a comparison here, so that's what I'm going to do. You know we moved from Holladay, UT, right near the center of the church, to Roswell, GA, right near the...ocean? It's two different worlds. And I'm going to break it down.

PROS:
-Everyone sweats. That's right. It's so hot and humid here that you go outside and you sweat and then when you come in the air conditioner makes everything better in a few minutes. In other words, it's not just me. And I like that because I don't have to feel as self conscious. There's some info about me you're loving, right?
-The characters. Now, I realize that this isn't exclusive to the South. You go into any major city and you're sure to find interesting people. But as I was driving through Buckhead the other day I'm positive I saw Kazam outside. Remember him? Rapping genie played by Shaq? I now think he's real.
-We're now much more obvious. It's one thing to be LDS in Utah. It's another thing to be LDS in Georgia. The spotlight is on us, and there are many more opportunities to stand out and be an example. Of course, with today's world, many times the example you want to set is looked as a negative thing, but it's refreshing. It's much more of the city on a hill experience.
-It's gorgeous here. Utah has mountains, and Holladay has trees, but in general it's boring and brown. The more I lived there the more I grew to enjoy it, but there's just something about being surrounded by greenery. Becky aches for the mountains, but I haven't missed them.

CONS:
-The streets. Now, Washington has bad streets. You have to pay close attention or you'll go down the wrong 14th street, and sometimes they'll be branching off from adjacent roads, and I thought it was a mess. Until I moved here. There are something like 104 streets named Peachtree in the Metro Atlanta area. Half of the time you'll go to an intersection and if you turn right you'll be on one street and if you turn left you'll be on another. It's disgusting. If we didn't have our GPS we would be hopelessly lost. Thanks Judy!
-The sprawl. I'm not trying to say that Utah was compact, but we have to take a five minute drive if we want to take a walk. It seems that everything is at least 20 minutes away. It's a very spread out area.
-The bugs. These things are disgusting. And huge. And everywhere. I had forgotten mosquitos existed. Now every time I go to the park I come home with three or four new bites. We found a cockroach in our apartment a few weeks ago (I killed it posthaste). Apparently this is normal.
-The traffic. I thought I had experience with traffic. I had gone through the years of construction on I-15, I was a pro. That was nothing. My class is 20 minutes away (see?) and I leave at the latest an hour ahead. It's ridiculous. LA has nothing on Atlanta. I know.

So there we go! A short list of pros and cons of living in Atlanta. We're loving it, we're surviving, and we're smiling. Thank you to everyone, and I hope you have a great day.