Westward Ho!

I must begin by apologizing for being so remiss with my fledgling blog. It has been three whole months with nary an entry and though I am not a big fan of excuses, I do have a really good one for my absence. Two months ago, I moved three thousand miles, in the company of my dog and very supportive boyfriend, to Portland, Oregon.



This great journey started a few years ago with a seductive article,
Portland, Oregon: Can a Place Be Too Perfect? I was immediately enchanted by the description of a city that not only seemed entirely focused on a love of food and drink, but was better yet, set in spectacular natural surroundings. I printed the article out for a close friend with the hope that we would both move there in the near future. My friend (dear Attia!) did in fact get a job as liaison to her company’s Portland office, and so was blessed with a few visits a year to this city. She would return to New York with tales of restaurants in quaint Victorian houses, people eating at outdoor cafes til all hours of the night during the summer and of course, the amazing food and drink! As I became more involved with my boyfriend, Court, we would dream about moving to the west coast. We contemplated never returning from a great trip up the Califorinia coast last year. But, as we waited almost an hour to cross the Bay Bridge on the last day of our trip, all of the reasons I moved away from the Bay Area years ago loomed before me and squelched any desire I had to move there.

As much as I loved living in New York for almost a decade, I had come to resent my long subway commute with people breathing down my neck, and more significantly, I was deeply agitated by the cost of living. The last six months I lived there, I could feel NYC’s hold on me loosening — however, I still had not found the place I wanted to land. Over the years, I would print out articles on Portland, and though it was always a potential destination, I could not conceptualize how on earth we would pick up and move there without jobs, friends or family. Then one fateful day last September, I decided that I was ready to not only find a new job, but to fly to Portland later that month to see if we could make a go of it. Court reasoned that we should wait until the following spring when we had enough vacation time to really absorb Portland and all it had to offer.



It was not too soon after that the New York Times dining section featured the city as a shiny gold beacon of food and drink, and I stumbled upon a job opening for an editor in Portland. From there, everything seemed to come together as if it were scripted and in my search for a new home, I did find a great city, but more than that, I found a wonderful job. I am now an editor at Timber Press where I am starting new lists in food, drink, sustainability and green living. We have been here now officially for two months and so far, Portland seems full of potential. And so, even though it feels like a happy ending to the story, it is just a new beginning.

And next week, the tales of Portland’s great food scene can finally begin…