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 I love
our house. We bought it 15 years ago and they've been the best
15 years of my life. We've spent a lot of time during that decade
and a half making our house a cool place... this webzine is named
after our house which we long ago named Wunderland, in part because
it's a place of wonders (and partly as a play on Wunderlich,
Kristin's maiden name).
But much as we love our house, we've decided that it's time
to move. The business
we started in our basement has expanded into our living room
and beyond... we have boxes stacked up everywhere and employees
have desks in every imaginable nook. And our business is still
growing. We need more room.
But we're not growing that fast... money remains as tight
as ever, and we live in an area where rent is anything but cheap.
It's not like we can afford to rent office space nearby. Also,
that would ruin our wonderful commute. So telling the business
to move out and get a place of its own is not an option. We want
to get a bigger place where we can all keep living together.
When we bought this house 15 years ago, it was our dream house.
For years, we figured we'd never move. But our dreams have expanded,
and they now require a bigger canvas.
I also love the DC area. I've lived here for 40 years and
they've been the best 40 years of my life. This town has a lot
going for it, and in many ways it's a great place to live. But
the traffic is dreadful here, and after living my whole life
in one place, I yearn to reside elsewhere for a change. (I like
to say I have George-Baileyitis.)
More importantly, we just don't feel safe in this town anymore.
Ever since 9/11 we've
been worrying that a terrorist with a WMD will strike that big
bullseye located just a few miles away. I hate sounding alarmist
and paranoid, and we don't like dwelling on this point since
we'll be leaving so many friends and family behind, but for this
reason if no other, we've decided to move out of the Washington
DC area.
And after all, friends and family (and inertia) are the only
things keeping us here at this point. Time was when we had secure
government job tying us to the area, but Kristin's been building
our business in such a way as to enable us to run things from
just about anywhere. The world is our oyster (whatever that means).
We're planning to put most of our belongings into deep storage
next spring (it's gonna take at least that long for us to get
all our stuff thinned down, packed up, and ready to store). We're
planning to spend the summer of 2005 living in an RV, driving
around the country, attending as many trade shows and conventions
as we can squeeze in, while our realtor works on selling our
empty house. A year or so from now, we hope to begin settling
down in our new home town.
And where will that be? Right now, the top candidate is in
Canada: a cool little town just outside of Toronto, called Guelph.
We visited Guelph during the summer
and were quite charmed by it.
That said, until we actually get there, we could always pick
another place. The final choice may depend on the events of the
next few weeks and months. If Bush wins the election, we'll be
going to Canada. If Kerry wins, we might decide to stay in the
USA, but that will depend on what the Supreme Court does with
the medical marijuana case they just agreed to rule on this term.
I've long been saying that marijuana prohibition is unconstitutional,
and that one of the ways it could end is for the Supreme Court
to strike it down with a ruling akin to the Roe vs. Wade decision,
which legalized abortion in 1973. This term, they will finally
be considering the question of whether an adult with a doctor's
recommendation should be allowed to grow and consume their own
medical marijuana, and I just can't see how they can uphold prohibition
any longer. Given that nearly 80% of Americans now support the
medical use of marijuana, the Justices should feel they have
enough public support to make such a ruling, and anyway, the
only constitutional leg the drug war has to stand on is the Commerce
Clause, which gives Congress the power to regulate the commerce
of goods between the states. But when a person grows his or her
own marijuana plants and harvests and consumes those plants on
their own in their own house, then there's no commerce of any
kind involved (let alone state-to-state commerce) and it shouldn't
be any of the government's business. How can the Supreme Court
possibly rule otherwise?
The pundits I've heard making predictions on this case don't
think anything will change. A lot of people also think Bush will
win the election. I'm an optimist, and I'd like to believe that
we're on the brink of major changes in this country. If I'm wrong,
we're moving to Canada. If I'm right, Guelph will still be our
top contender, but we'd be open to other suggestions for awhile.
Either way, next year we're planning to sell our house and move!
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