Date: Fri, March 8, 1996 11:02:29 EST
To: Elizabeth
Executive summary: Don't go unless it's temporary.
That advice may sound shocking from a man born in New Jersey and who proceeded to spend the next twenty years attending 14 different schools in 10 different cities, lived on both coasts and within 30 miles of both Canada and Mexico, but trust me, it means I know whereof I speak.
On a purely selfish basis, it means I'll see no more and no less of you - two to four times a year, at conferences. So I have no particular axe to grind with respect to dinner partners or weekend brunches.
This circle of friends may indeed be a cosmopolitan bunch that spends its spare time building up those frequent flier miles, but our friendships were formed and are best maintained face to face. All friendships work much better when we can keep face-to-face going regularly. Yes, some of us do stay in touch regularly between the face to face meetings. But it's been my experience that the further apart those meetings become, the further apart we grow.
For your and my friendship, your relocating to Switzerland would mean only that I can't wave as you pass over glorious Dexter at 30,000 feet. Or not as often, anyway. But for your Bay area friends, it will eventually result in a big change.
I've lived within a 30 mile circle (Dexter, Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti) for twenty years now. Ruth was born here, and has never lived outside that circle. Our daughter Kate is now babysitting the kids of our friends - friendships that that are now twenty years old. Those friendship are, in my humble opinion, deeper and richer because of that duration. By contrast, look at my parents. They still move every five to ten years. At their 50th wedding anniversary back in January, there was no-one in attendance who'd known them more than ten years except my fathers' family. Ruth and I will be having our 20th in a couple of years, and we honestly expect to see almost every groomsman and bridesmaid from our wedding. If she or I had taken any of a number of offers to move (some of which were very attractive) we wouldn't still be close to all those people. Instead we'd be around people who don't remember what we went through to have children, or how close we came to losing Rob - and whose trials we don't know and didn't help with.
If Switzerland is lucrative, temporary, and will give you the flexibility to return home and make decisions at your own pace, then do it. But if it means near-permanent change, take the advice of one who has lived all over the place: in this world, nothing is more important than friends and family. Friendship requires those late night confidences, the touch of a consoling or congratulating hand, and the impromptu ``It's X o'clock, I'm hungry, and you're the best person I can think of for companionship.'' Email is nice, but it can't take the place of having a home and living in it. From what I've seen, it's pretty clear that your home is in the Bay area. That's precious, and something that should only be given up in the face of necessity.
That said, do what makes you happy. As your friends, how could we want less for you?
Steve
Postscript: After accumulating the responses, Elizabeth decided to pursue the job. She now resides in Switzerland.