Living in the suburbs?

[jocmtl]

Hi there,

My partner and I currently live in the city, which we've always loved. But now that we have a baby, we're finding city living is really getting on our nerves. Our little one constantly gets woken up from noise in the back alley, and our tiny brick patio is too hot during the day to enjoy. On a sunny day, we have to pack up and head to a park to enjoy the summer sun! Our place is a little too small, too. :

We are now considering moving to a house in a nearby suburb. It's lovely, right near a lake, lots of trees and grass, and an easy commute into town.

We are worried, however, about being the only lesbians on the block type of thing (there are two other lesbian couples on our current block, and one of them with a baby, so we're not exactly shocking or even novel), and I was wondering if any of you have this kind of experience, and if so if you would care to share it. Have you had trouble with neighbors? If your kids are in school or daycare, has having two mommies been a big deal?

I should add that we don't live in a particulary homophobic part of the world; Quebec is a remarkably open society.

I'd love to hear from you!

[mamimapster]

Wow,
(just a warning that this will be long)
hard question. I am a city person who has only lived out of a major city twice, once when I lived 1 block out of the city, and now when I live six blocks out of the city. That said, I DO like our quiet "suburban" neighborhood, but it is very much like the part of Chicago my relatives lived in when I was a kid. I loved being a City kid, but only because I had tons of freedom as a kid, being a city kid meant that I got to have all that the city offered in the way of libraries, parks, museums, beach, etc. etc. I knew how to navigate the train systems very early and spent so many lovely rainy afternoons in the art institute.I was really poor as a kid, but didn't feel it because my experienes were so rich, I had friends many different cultural/religious backgrounds, I also knew how to get into the Local State college library when I was in HS and would spent lots of pleasant time there. I would never move into a suburb where I didn't know there was already some GLBT community, because I wouldn't feel safe.

We were lucky in that we were able to find:
1. a house with a small grassy yard/patio/garage
2. a suburb that is walking distance to city public transit
3. EVERYTHING here is pretty much walking/bicycling/public transport distance
4. very active GLBT organizations both in our suburb and the one directy across the stree from us (the suburb across the street is "one of the top 10 places for GLBT families to lvie in the us"- why do we live across the street from them? see #1 we couldn't afford a house there!

This is about as suburban as I ever want to get. I grew up in a very multicultural/multiracial area and my family is both of those things. Strangly because the City is getting so expensive there are a lot more glbt families moving out to the burbs. and our Rainbow Families group is growing increasingly suburban. That being said,if we had the means to pick up our house and move it to a neighborhood in the city where we want to lvei we would do it it a heartbeat.

[witt]

kind of relevant

we live in the "burbs" in New Zealand, not big but not small (well Wellington has 450,000 people and it's the capital!!).

And actually what i've learnt is that you just have to TAKE your space, just claim it. We are the only two muma family in our Steiner kindy and whereever we go it's the same thing. But I just take a big breath and say "yes my children have two mummies aren't they lucky!" and dare anyone to say otherwise!

stuff em, otherwise!!! :LOL

[jocmtl]

Thanks for the replies!

OK, now my turn to !

Mamimaptser, I know what you mean about the great things the city has to offer a kid. I feel the same way. Tonight, we took Jonah on a stroll (can't sleep in the heat wave), and we walked on our favorite funky street, with its outdoor cafés filled with lingering hipsters, and I thought, oh, I will miss that! Our potential burb is really close to the city and we have no intention of abandoning our lovely city. We still want that, but we also want quiet and more space, neither of which we can afford in the city.

Witt, I get your drift about taking our space. That's more or less what I told my dp last night; we just have to do it. We can't not go because we are afraid of that.

It's funny because I grew up in a small town, and later in the suburbs (close to where we may end up), and I've always had a pang for them. Something about the trees, the quiet, and in this case, the water (near a lake). But I never thought I'd actually move there. It seemed so impossible, mostly because of being queer. Then we went to an open house just for fun and fell in love! We're both really psyched about it. I'm thrilled about the prospect of our son having a yard.

We still have to sell our place in the city, so it might not work out. I doubt we'd look for another place if it fell through; we'd probably stay in the city for a while longer.

If it works out, our neighbors will just have to get used to big, queer BBQ's in our backyard!