So your wife doesn't value God, the USA and freedom, wants to take the kids back to a place that doesn't value God, the USA and freedom and you're okay with that?
You also didn't mention if she came along reluctantly in the first place. Did she move to Idaho because her family came first?
While I appreciate you moral compass in wanting to keep the family whole, from experience I can tell you the next 7 years will probably be hell. Good Luck.
You’d better figure out which state will serve you better during the divorce.
I can understand your wife’s feelings. My first job after grad school was in San Jose and I ended up spending 12 years there before moving back to the Midwest about 9 years ago. The first few years back were rough as I was constantly nostalgic for my time there. If not for my wife and kids I might have succumbed to the temptation to go back.
I have a love/hate with Cali. I love the mountains, ocean, weather, the redwoods on one side and the chaparral on the other and so much beautiful variety in nature within just a few hours drive. I enjoyed the intellectual engagement I had at work and the openness to new ideas and trying new things, the wide variety of cultures mixing from around the world is exciting and so many options for good food. I had a wonderful church community that was very conservative, in part because we all ran from the liberal parishes that were the norm.
I traded that for a small town in the Midwest where people are very practical and don’t get interested in new ideas easily, they tend to be very insular and parochial. The weather is too cold in the winter and too humid in the summer, and too unpredictable to make any outdoor plans beyond the next couple days. I can drive for hours in any direction and the scenery won’t change much, just go from slightly more hilly with trees to flatter and few trees. I don’t particularly like my coworkers but even if I wanted to go out to lunch with them, none of the restaurants are very good or exciting. The local parishes were lukewarm and there weren’t many choices with such a relatively small Catholic community in the area.
On the other hand I have learned to accept these things because it is better here, much better for my wife and kids. The world is taking an exponentially faster journey into insanity in recent years, with California as an epicenter. Many California friends have fled the state so I wouldn’t even have that circle to return to. Here I have given my family a large home with several acres to roam so that my younger kids have grown up in a radically different environment than the older kids. We are setting up a homestead with chickens, goats, rabbits and just started beekeeping. I have taken up woodworking with tools I never would have had space for in Cali. Those practical, insular locals don’t have any time for the insanity running rampant in the world right now. God has provided for our spiritual needs by building around us a community of families and clergy that are increasingly traditional. And of course the last year as our lives were only marginally changed by COVID, those left in California were living under terror of the virus and draconian restrictions on freedom that made me so thankful that we aren’t there now.
Your wife needs to give it more time. I think she is also projecting her dissatisfaction adjusting to the new place on the kids. They don’t need that stuff she thinks they are missing out on and are in a healthier environment. In the end California is no longer what she remembers it being, the last year has changed it. The natural beauty is obviously still there but the culture is irreversibly changed by current evens in a bad way.
Till death fo us part....
I would consider California as
as the most “last resort” area
to move back to. Try Arizona.
You need a new wife.
Too bad. CAs gonna suck even more in a couple of years and even more after that. Small town life is the way to go. I can enjoy every bit of digital entertainment the world has to offer, I still have my hobbies delivered to me via UPS or FedEx. What I don’t have are the pollution, congestion and the pile of rude stupids that populate every street and building. Small town life is such a blessing.
It’s kinda embarrassing when someone says Bosie isn’t ‘cosmopolitan’, I mean, seriously, are you even looking around? Russian restaurants, Ethiopian, a patisserie which could put some of the best in the US to shame, a fantastic soda bar, some surprisingly good sushi... Sounds like the wife doesn’t know how to use Google Maps and pretty much ignores the local facebook groups.
And considering my house in California has gone up in value about 25% in the last 9 months, I don’t think she understands how little the escape money will go coming back to California.
If she must have her taste of authoritarian California, Spokane is right up the road.
Get divorced in Boise.
TBH, I think this is deeper than where to live. It may be that the two of you need to find someone you both trust by way of a counselor. If you don’t know anyone, get recommendations.
How realistic is her going back by herself, with the children presumably. How would that work out financially without you, especially if RE prices are on the rise as someone suggested? And has she been back lately to see what it is like now?
A smart man would divorce her using the local Boise court system. This way, the Evil-As-Hell Divorce Court System in California cannot totally destroy your life as a man.
Send her packing back to the communist rat-hole that is California, and let her suffer under the jackboots of Pelosi, Newsom, and the rest of the psychopaths out there.
Divorce you moron wife.
The housing costs in the last nine months in California is off the rails. I'm in SB and my house has easily gone up 25%. Should be interesting how that is going to go for you two. Houses often have more than 6 offers. Here in SB it is up to 22 offers on a home.
A few here mentioned a compromise Red California area (maybe something not to far from your stomping grounds that you can visit?
You children will be fine and Boise is an excellent place to raise thriving children. But no place is great if you and your wife are not working together as a team.
So my advice is to make that a priority. I pray you both together find compromises and/or solutions that support and honor you both. And may your marriage become stronger because of it.
She might be surprised at how many Californians and NYers head there every summer for several weeks to brainstorm, hold events that stimulate the mind and cultural self (albeit VERY annoyingly liberal bent at times and has gotten increasingly so over the years.) It might be her cup of tea. I'm very cosmopolitan and sophisticated and attend many events in Sun Valley Idaho each year as do many across the country. But I also LOVE Boise.
Maybe share with her too how you guys can most likely do much more travel to the areas she loves and new places as well. I grew up in that area btw and very blessed creatively and intellectually because of it. There was a freedom that couldn't be replicated in a big city or a more 'culturally marxist' world you might find in the area you two moved from. But I'm unsure of your exact locations and situation when living in California.
Tell your wife you will agree to move if she gives up sugar consumption for a month.
If she agrees & follows through in 30 days her brain will not be as inflamed & her clarity of thought will be improved to where she won’t want to be so foolish as to think moving back into socialism is a good thing.
Don’t doubt me. I’ve watched hard core lefties come to the Constitution & exhibit conservative thinking after they’ve given up sugar.
35 years ago, I worked in San Francisco for 1-1/2 years. It was a magnet for freaks back then. I cannot imagine what it’s like now. It’s not a good place to raise children. Avoid it like the plague.
There are some underlying issues here that were left out. Being a woman, I know that many women hold their true feelings in and just kinda go along with things for a bit until it spirals out of control internally. I have a feeling that there were things she wanted to say about the move but didn’t, and now she is letting it all out at once and using any excuse possible to convince you to go back.
Honestly, it doesn’t sound to me like she’s putting family first in the way that you would yourself. CA is a really toxic place to live, as even in conservative areas, the taxes are still soul-crushing, as are the policies of the state, not to mention the Godawful schools.
Before you make a decision, I would recommend sitting down with a therapist or pastor/priest (not sure if you’re Catholic?) and talk things through HONESTLY. My husband and I are all about communication, and we don’t hide anything from one another. If we feel a certain way, we let the other know. I learned the hard way with my ex of seven years that it’s a two-way street. He would be vicious, and I’d sit there and take it, keeping to myself.
Besides, you’ll be lucky to find work (depending on what you do) and be equally lucky to find somewhere you can afford (also depending on how much money you have squirreled away along with the value of your current home). I must also press that moves are incredibly stressful, particularly on kids.
I wonder how they feel about it?
Your wife is not a conservative but instead a liberal in sheep’s clothing with her demand for the kids to be exposed to “worldly things” and sophistication. I can not help you with an answer to your problem but can at least help you see that the way your wife demands is exactly how liberals (leftists) think and act.