It has come to our attention that this town has done all it can for us. As we noshed on Colombian food yesterday, we discovered that we both have had enough of the ATL.
Nick was having sympathy pains for me all weekend and yesterday he was particularly disgruntled (while I was feeling better). As I was trying to figure out what was wrong with him, I suddenly realised that he has a bad case of what I call Itchy Foot. Itchy Foot is something I’ve had all my life; it got me away from Knoxville and it has spurred me to travel to France as well as drive to CA – twice. This is an odd discovery since Nick is not one to suffer from Itchy Foot. But, as we talked, I saw the signs: disenchantment with the area, boredom with the job, lack of anyone with whom we have anything in common, nonexistent social life (see previous), sick of constantly being barraged by GHETTO – the list goes on. Once we realised that we’re both on the same page (as usual), we both felt tons better.
We are redoubling our efforts to get the FUCK out of this ghetto ass town. As soon as we can get out from under this house, we are GONE. We need new energy. New challenges. New people. We can’t do it without a new job, too, so it’s gonna take a minute. Which is fine. Just knowing that we both want out (not just me) is a wonderful thing.
It’s not that we don’t have friends – of course we do and we love our friends, but they have all gone off to breed and/or have no interest in what we do, which is fast becoming our whole life. The few (VERY FEW) friends we have left who are not breeders are either 50 miles away or out every single night (we’ve got comics to produce and going out every night is just not our bag) or simply not interested in comics.
We feel isolated and very far removed from the industry we are trying to break into and it’s frustrating. The lovely folks that come to the cartoonist meetings are great and perhaps this group will start to gel eventually, but currently it’s not enough to call them friends. More like professional associates. Which is FINE, we didn’t start it to find friends, we started it to find other sequential artists. Making friends is just a nice benny.
The upshot is that we feel that we’ve reached the bottom of the well for Atlanta. We’ve got a few more years here, obviously, and maybe things will change, but right now, we would chuck everything in a truck and move to Phoenix so fast it’d make your head spin. We can’t do that, obviously, but if debt and jobs weren’t issues, Atlanta would be eating our dust.
I just thought I’d toss that out there and see if anyone has comments or suggestions for even better places to live than Phoenix. CA is not an option, btw. We can’t stand the politics of that state and we damn sure can’t afford it, either.
Again, to reiterate: we <3 our friends here. And we are NOT bitter about their life choices. We just need to find some new energy and people who are doing what we are doing. To everything there is a season and I think our time in Atlanta is coming to an end. Hopefully sooner rather than later. I’m looking forward to the future!
Bummer. Well, I hear Straub and Kurtz are moving to Washington, so that’s definitely an option ;)
Like I want to be near Kurtz? LOL
We like the idea of WA, but I don’t think I can handle the weather. Not only lots of RAIN, but lots of snow, too. ICK.
But, not to worry, this is gonna take a while. Like years. The economy has screwed us pretty hard and we can’t sell this place until the value comes back up some. It will NEVER be what it was due to the high foreclosure rate in this area. We’ll be lucky to break even. :-/
I know that the SF Bay Area is freakishly expensive and therefore financially traumatic to move to, otherwise I would be the first to insist that you move here and the first to appear on your doorstep with the organic vegan hempseed crust apple pie of welcome.
However, may I recommend Portland? Two couples of my friends moved there in the past year and are thrilled with it. Packed with culture and good food, near gorgeous nature but with plenty to do, mild weather, and vastly more affordable than SF. One couple of my friends are both now able to focus on making a living via their creative work now.
Also, it’s home to Oni Press and Dark Horse and much more within travel range of Emerald City con in Seattle as well as being much cheaper flights from WonderCon, APE and SDCC.
Just something to chew on.
Love you guys! xoxoxo
But seriously, even though we have no intention of leaving Atlanta, if something happened that we had to look for greener pastures, most likely we’d be heading to Canada. For reals.
i’m certainly not going to be bitter about my nearest and dearest grabbing the brass ring. i get it.
we’ll prolly jet after law school ourselves, depending on what sort of offers i get – and where we can escape to.
i still have a lot to like about atlanta, but it’s too sprawling for me, i’ve been her 5 years and i still can’t get used to the constant cross town schlep to do anything fun.
Yah, I’m currently looking into Portland Ore. The weather is certainly less extreme than Phoenix and not as rainy as I’d feared. And with Kelly having friends that have recently moved there, that’s even more incentive to look at it closely.
For you, Caroline, I know Atlanta was a very good move. Beats the shit out of NOLA for opportunities. But it’s too physically big and too ghetto anywhere near the actual city. If you don’t mind driving about 45 minutes to do *anything* it’s just great to live in the ‘burbs. Living in town is OK if you can tolerate the extreme ghetto bullshit 24/7. Not a day goes by that I don’t wish I didn’t live here.
And yes, we do have awesome friends here, but honestly? Nothing in common any more. We do comics and attend conventions TO WORK. We don’t have brats and don’t particularly like them. We don’t go to conventions to play or costume or any of that – we go to promote our comic. And to top it all off, the majority of our pals live 40-60 mins away. We’ve got a few still brave enough to live in this ghetto ass city, but not many.
So, yah, the appeal of the ATL is pretty much zero. It’s definitely time to go.
I can understand the wanting to move part. Atlanta used to be a fun city to live in, but in the last five years, it’s been losing a lot of soul.
Indeed. Short list: Phoenix, Portland OR, Seattle WA and Las Vegas. Desert vs Pacific NW!