used be a bigger dope

I used to be a much bigger dope than I am now. I don't think I am a dope at all.

In 2001, when my daughter disowned me, I wanted to move back to Minnesota, where I had gone to law school, raised Rosie and lived the longest of anywhere.  I grew up in Chicago but have not lived there since I left home for college at age 18. Minnesota feels like home to me.

I moved to the Pacific Northwest instead because my daughter had told me I could never move back to Minneapolis because she might return there to live after college. And I, mickey the mope, let her demand control my life choices. First, I pleaded. I pointed out that living in a metropolitan area with millions of residents left plenty of room for Rosie and I to live in the same place and never have contact.  I pointed out that once she finished college, and she was a sophomore in college at Cornell at the time, she could end of living anywhere and I should not be limited in my own life choices because she might want to return to Minneapolis.

She did not return to Minneapolis to live. She spent a few years in NYC, then moved to Chicago, which is where I grew up.

Having written the above, I acknowledge I always felt a draw to the West Coast. I applied, and was accepted, to a couple law schools on the West Coast. That time, I let my dad's bullying keep me in the Midwest. There were something like 12 law schools in Chicago. I did not apply to any law schools in Illinois. I wanted to get away from my toxic family.

I guess my daughter considers me toxic and that's why she has so assiduously avoided me since 2001. WTF did I do?

And WTF did I let her bully me into not moving back to Minnesota, where I had the deepest social network.

Shoulda woulda coulda.

I like living in Berkeley. I like not having frigid winters.  But I lack a sense of family and of groundedness. I notice flickering thoughts, rare ones, of returning to the Midwest.  I don't really want to move back to the Midwest but I want a chosen family of friends. I don't have that anywhere.

Rosie was wrong to insist I could never live in Minneapolis in case she ever opted to return. I was wrong to capitulate to her demand. And, yet, I am glad I spent time in the Pacific Northwest and I like living in the SF Bay Area. I like Berkeley.

I have yearnings to live in the countryside, in a small community, in a small house but those are inchoate longings with no grounding. I think such longings reflect my low grade discontent, not a true desire to move.