We recently moved to the Greater Seattle area. We’ve been following our career and without much thinking we said yes to the next step. Of all places we landed in Norkirk in Kirkland WA, a beautiful, extremely overpriced, perfectly manicured suburban area. The views of Lake Washington are absolutely gorgeous, people are healthy and the flowers… oh man the flowers. If Willam Sonoma could design a city, that would be Kirkland WA. This place is great, but like most stories, it has two very different sides. One side feels like you should be sipping Chardonnay all day in your backyard, surrounded by flowers, green grass, and a spectacular view of the Lake or the city. This side, would probably set you back 2.8M dollars. The other side is a bit different, tech PMs with a bag of broken dreams stacked on top of each other, cramped in one bedroom dark dungeons that reminds us why people like Kurt Cobain would kill themselves in a place like this. That is our side, the good news, this side would only set you back 3K per month.
Big part of my live I’ve spent it outdoors. Either at home in Vina del Mar, Chile hoping around waves. In Portillo Chile, skiing around big mountains, hiking, swimming and once again skiing beautiful Lake Tahoe. Being outside makes me happy. Feeling the sun on my face, breathing fresh air, the smell of the sage, plants, flowers, even cow poop, makes me go back to those young days where I use to roll around in dirt, not thinking about where the next paycheck will come from. Being outside, makes me forget about bills, debt, mortgage, and day to day stress. Reminds me that the reason we are here is for learning new things and why not, just enjoying life.
And then the COVID19 thing happened, we moved here exactly 2 months ago. On the day they decided to lock-down Washington. We planned to have this little apartment as a hub, to come in and out. Now, we are stuck in here and clouds over my head have been getting quite dark. I’ve never though much about mental health. But the days we’ve been locked in this dark hole have been making me think about how important it is.
Then, we went outside. Clouds lifted immediately, fresh air in my lungs, smile on my face. We have decided to do #1hikeaweek and document it on Instagram, to discover Washington and stay sane, stay with us through this journey of selfawareness, evaluation, outdoors and overall health.
Love
the writing ape.
The writing monkey 
Read your newest post this morning (Green Lake Seattle – Can’t hurt me) and was going to leave a remark on that compelling self-reflection but looks like you had second thoughts. Sounds like you’re thinking of make a move away from Kirkland. Can’t go too wrong with Green Lake, beautiful in-city neighborhood with pleasant, uniquely Seattle suburban vibe. live south of the Ship Canal now but always been very partial to Wallingford and Green Lake. My wife and I lived a block from the lake during the Jurassic period, we managed a small apartment building for a much-needed rent reduction (those were the old, but only relatively cheaper days) and I’ll never forget how amazing it was to walk or jog around the lake at the drop of a hat. I’ve got two grade school boys nowadays and Green Lake has been one of our go-to places for exercise the past few months, the wide lawns make it easy to be socially distanced and yet feel like we’re “with everyone” and not so isolated.
Belated welcome to Seattle. It was a pretty tough, strange time for you and your s/o to make a big life change like that. Glad you’re feeling better about it. It’s fun reading a newcomer perspective to the city, seeing Seattle through the lens of different life experiences. Strangely I like some of your marketing/tech articles/essays, too, even though I’m a relative luddite. Really liked the one about privacy vs. positive footprint, that echoes some thoughts I had in the past year, kind of confirms the decision I made to go that route with a couple social media spots.
at any rate, good tidings to you R. and hope you’ll keep journaling on the blog.
cheers,
Jason
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Jason, wow man, you don’t even know how much appreciate your note. Yes, I had a moment of doubt about the amount of info I want to put out there, so I edited a bit and put it it back out there again, I think I will keep the detail for myself, but I think the exercise of looking yourself at the mirror and understanding where you come from, and like the beast Goggins says, use that to keep moving forward is still valid. Things are changing, and definitely feeling better of being here, thank you and definitely your kind comment and encouragement as it goes long ways, will definitely keep writing as I think it will be good to look back when all this is over. Cheers to you sir, and thanks for the kind words.
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Seattle is a cool area. If you are an outdoor person I would suggest looking up Washington Trail Association. I have volunteered with them on trail projects but their website has a great group of outdoor people who post trail conditions. Enjoy your time in Seattle area.
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Will do will do!! Thank you for the tip, someone mentioned it too. I think its a great area, its just hard to see it during this whole process. But I am sure it will shine through, we are actually loving the outdoors! thanks again
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