Chest beating and navel gazing

As the title says...and if you're not in the mood for reading self-examination, please move along.

I've been feeling both excited and terrified by the upcoming move. Yes, there's the stuff aspect, but that's not the terrifying thing. Ten years ago, the Better Half and I got married. We were living the big city life. We traveled a good amount. We had, if not all the comforts, at least a sufficiency of them. Now we're moving into a double-wide trailer to raise pigs.

This is something we've discussed and agreed upon, so I can't and won't claim I haven't been told. But it's still frightening. Having grown up in a culture that places so much value on success in the rat race and the accumulation of bigger and better stuff, it's hard to totally turn my back on that. I've never been on more than the periphery of it all, but there's an attitude that permeates everything.

Most of the people we know are happy for us and are themselves only at the periphery. This helps. Some of them may wish to buy animal flesh from us. Family has largely not suggested we have our heads examined. This helps too. But still. There's this nagging feeling we're depriving the Spawn of all the opportunities she ought to have. Rural life, even semi-rural and within acceptable reach of a decent sized metropolis is NOT the same as urban life. Friends her age will necessarily be further away. Exciting classes at the museum or the zoo will not be something we do very often. We aren't likely going to be taking her on any trips 'round the world. Having livestock will make it difficult to even visit our widely scattered family, who can no better afford to visit us than we them.

Yet I think given how things seem to be heading, what we are doing is the right thing. And the food will be better. But it's still hard.