[throwaway713]

I worry about this. My wife and I had an agreement before we got married that if I got a good job offer in tech, I could take it, but we would live three years on the west coast max before moving back to be closer to family.

Well, I lucked out and did get a great job, and so we moved to the Bay Area a few years ago. Right when I was trying to figure out what to do since my three years would be up, the pandemic occurred and my company announced permanent remote work. With a new baby and wildfire smoke everywhere, we decided to move back six months early. I took my job with me, and we've been in the southeast since last fall.

I absolutely hate being back here. There's no one in my field or industry, I don't fit in with the culture of this place, and I miss almost everything about the Bay Area. We currently live in a little tourist town at the moment which is sort of nice, but my wife doesn't like it and wants to move again back to her hometown (which has neither jobs nor anything interesting to do).

So I guess I'll sit in a little room by myself on Zoom all day with coworkers 2,200 miles away, make 8x the median household income, and do nothing but invest it while living in the middle of nowhere for the next 20 years and despising every minute of it. At this point I'm just waiting until my kid is 18 and then I'll buy a tiny second home somewhere that I actually like and just travel there by myself occasionally I guess.

[NDizzle]

Get involved in youth... whatever. Sports, robotics, scouts, chess club, something. Spread knowledge and problem solving skills. Buy a spot on a lake or a river. Doesn't have to have a house - somewhere you can camp. Put up a yurt if you need something more solid than a tent. Float down wild rivers. Go fishing. Restore a car. Learn how to work with fiberglass. Don't sit there for 20 years and hate it.