Returning "Home" to Seattle

First of all, thanks to Tim for setting up this excellent diversion. I think a group moving blog is just legitimate enough to qualify as a semi-excuse for not being busy packing boxes right now. I normally maintain my blog over at livejournal under the name Lapith, but this summer my posts have stopped entirely as I studied for the Washington bar exam. I'm guessing that for the next few weeks at least I'll continue to not post to my own blog, since most everything happening to me is going to be move-related. (Although I'm considering cross-posting.) Anyhow, the same busy studying and relentless stressing that kept me from lj'ing this summer has also made me rather poor company, so my thanks also to Tim, Jess, my brother Thomas who was living with us for the summer, and especially Matthew for putting up with my cranky, law-filled self all summer long. I'm glad to be done with tests and preparing for a lovely road trip: 2 vehicles! 4 adults! 5 ferrets! 15 states! Utter mayhem!

I'm the only one of the four of us adventurers who actually has any real ties to Seattle. I consider myself from the Seattle area, and in fact my parents and all 3 of my siblings still live in the area. Because I'm one of "those people" who always talks about how much better home is than wherever he is at present, people who know nothing else about me know that I'm "from Seattle." But in full disclosure, I've now spent more time away from Washington than I ever spent in it.

In fact, I never lived in Seattle itself. I was born in Walnut Creek, California, and lived for most of my elementary school years in Fairfield, which at that time was a quiet but rapidly growing suburb just inland from the eastern tip of San Francisco Bay. I moved with my family to Maple Valley, WA (about 45 minutes south of Seattle) in March 1992, when I was 11 years old. We ended up moving a few miles down the road, and from 7th grade onward I lived in a part of then-unincorporated King County that is now the city of Covington. But then I left for college in Phoenix (where I met Matthew), then left for law school in Boston (where I met Tim and Jess). So all told I lived 11 years in California, 8 years out of Washington for school, and only 7 1/2 years in Washington. Ok, so I've returned for holidays and summer jobs, but still, it's a bit embarrassing after all my puffery!

So am I a Washingtonian? Do I even know enough about my "home" state to be of any use to my new transplanted friends? We'll find out soon enough, but I suspect that my teenage memories about the area range from nostalgically misty, to fuzzy, to simply not there. And much has changed in the 8 years I've been gone. I left Seattle as the dot-com bubble was furiously inflating itself, and return as the state has reworked its economy into one of the best states for business, according to Forbes magazine. Most of my close friends from high school have moved on (to California, Alaska, D.C., Louisiana...)--but luckily, I'm importing 3 excellent friends with me.

Here we come. Ready or not.