We got cold

What happened was it snowed in Raleigh, N.C. 

Deb and I had grown up and spent our lives in Central Pennsylvania so it wasn't like we didn't know what snow was or how to wrap a scarf around our necks or pull on a pair of gloves. We'd lived through blizzards. We'd shoveled snow. 

But we were retired and could live anywhere. We didn't have to put up with the cold. 

We started looking for someplace warmer. Someplace we could play tennis all year. Someplace it didn't snow.

We gave ourselves five years to explore life in the Southeast: North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.. During those five years we grew uncomfortable with life in the United States. We overheard racist comments too often. We saw people carrying guns. The news didn't help: Police killing civilians (3 a day so far in 2023); attacks on gay rights and on women's autonomy; school shootings - over and over again; a disregard for basic human needs - health care, housing, food. You name it. And then Covid became a political issue. Basic health measures became painted as attacks on "muh freedoms."

We turned our eyes toward Europe.

We had visited Montpellier, France, for a few weeks and loved the environment, the public transportation, the food, the easy access to the rest of Europe. In 2022 we flew to Alicante for three months to see how Spain felt.

It felt great.

We returned and began exploring how we could move there. The answer was a Non-Lucrative Visa. 

We retained a lawyer in Alicante to help us, began gathering documents, put our house on the market, got our visas, climbed on a plane and, well, here we are.