The Good, the Bad, and Tennessee

In less than two weeks Brett and I will officially say goodbye to Tennessee and be on our way to Oregon. We have spent just over four years here (we arrived on August 7, 2022), thinking we’d only be around for two when we first arrived. We added on the extra years as our daughter-in-law’s time the Japanese Consulate kept getting extended, and with our son still in Japan we knew she could not manage on her own with our grandchildren attending schools in two different directions with two totally different time schedules. With our son’s return to the U.S. earlier this year we are free to pick up our lives again and we’re finally moving on. The only thing keeping us here right now it the final date of our lease.

Our time in Tennessee has been bittersweet. We absolutely loved having so much time with our DIL and grandchildren, and loved being able to help M out with her sometimes crazy schedule. We were able to watch the kids grow and change, share in their successes and many other events, and just generally have a great time all around with them. We also ended up getting to see our son more than we expected as he visited as often as he could. In return, M & M were very generous with us, covering our childcare expenses as well as paying for my two summer trips to Japan. Their time apart however was very difficult for their family and we are thrilled they are now able to be together more frequently. M has one more year to finish at the Nashville Consulate, and will be making twice monthly weekend trips to New Jersey, then will move there to be with her family for good at the beginning of summer next year. The extra year here will put her in a good position to potentially be hired at the Japanese consulate in New York City, or with several other businesses in New York.

During our time in Tennessee, we were able to get together a few times with fellow blogger Tamara and her husband, always a good time. Brett and I also had fun discovering places in Nashville and the surrounding area: Cheekwood Gardens, Parnassus Books, hikes in Percy Warner and Marcella Vivrette Smith parks, a drive down the Natchez Trace, and more. We spent a beautiful fall weekend in western North Carolina, visiting Biltmore in Asheville with all their Christmas finery up, and I finally got to see where Brett’s family came from and where he vacationed when he was young. After a difficult time with the cheap furniture we initially bought (for a two-year stay), we gradually changed over to some better quality pieces that we love and intend to keep. Both of us have read a lot of good books over the years and had fun creating our little book collection. We signed up for and enjoyed good food from Too Good to Go (I’ve already got my Portland favorites loaded!) and made a few trips to McKay’s to look for used books – what a place! We were gifted with tickets for an incredible taiko drum show and a very funny traditional Japanese comedy show by the Japanese Consulate. I worked at our local Trader Joe’s for nearly a year, the best and most fun job I have ever had, but had to leave when my back gave out from all the heavy lifting. We also celebrated Christmas together with our entire family every year in our (cramped) apartments, but WenYu has picked up the torch for future holiday gatherings at her (big) house in Massachusetts. I tried Nashville hot chicken, which was not for me, but loved finding good biscuits and gravy and having a meat & three now and again. We never made it to the Parthenon, or the Grand Old Opry at the Ryman Auditorium or the Country Music Hall of Fame, but neither of us is a fan of country music so we’re okay with that. We did stop at a Buccee’s once in west Tennessee to use the bathrooms, but once was enough. We also never went to Dollywood – our amusement park days are over – although we heard it was very nice and the food was good.

Our two wonderful little dogs, Kaipo and Tilly, joined us during our time here, joyous occasions both times. They have changed everything in the best ways, and we can’t image our life without them.

Tennessee is a very beautiful state. We visited many parts of it during our time here and have been amazed and impressed by the natural beauty that abounds, and with the history of the state as well, especially the Civil War years. Top of our list is Smoky Mountains National Park, but we also enjoyed being able to spend a day at the Shiloh battlefield to take in the history there. We’ve visited almost all the Civil War sights in Franklin, been west to Memphis (where we were married), visited Hot Springs, Mammoth Caves, and Shenandoah national parks, and took a waterfall tour in the eastern part of the state. We quickly grew tired however of visiting former plantation homes (they’re all over the place here) and there are so many roadside historical signs that we eventually gave up trying to read them all.

We have spent all four of our Tennessee years in Franklin, in Williamson County, just south of Nashville. We enjoyed drives through some of the countryside but mostly the overall landscape of the area just never did much for us – it’s rural but is filled with lots of mostly giant houses and housing developments. I realized during our time here how much I missed having green around all the time, whether that was the fir trees of the Pacific Northwest or the tropical landscape of Hawaii. Deciduous trees just didn’t do much for me, even the big, old ones, although they were beautiful when the colors changed. When the leaves all fell off though I got depressed. Autumn color here has been hit or miss each year (although we definitely hit it right when we went to North Carolina), and we enjoyed hunting for hedge apples/Osage oranges to put out in the apartment each fall. We walked regularly at our first apartment because it had a great path and was surrounded by old forest, pine trees, and plenty of wildlife which kept it interesting. Walking at our current location has been the opposite: there are not a lot of trees around, or at least nothing but recent plantings – forests in the area have been cut down and the land flattened for the many housing developments, business parks, strip malls, hotels, and apartment buildings that keep popping up everywhere.

We’ve never lived in any place like the franchise paradise that exists here in Franklin and Brentwood, where every brand of hotel/motel is available within a five-mile radius along with every brand of chain restaurant or store. After four years I can still get easily lost because everything looks the same to me, and I can’t figure out east from west, or north from south (so grateful Brett has an incredible sense of direction and that our car has GPS). The county is full of absolutely massive homes and apartment complexes, which include the two we’ve lived in. Driving by many of the houses in the area, I have often wondered, who are these people that need so much space? The churches have also been mind-boggling for me. Most have absolutely HUGE sanctuaries for hundreds and hundreds of people, and there are several intersections with a church on each corner with each having a massive parking lot and attached school/academy. Williamson is the wealthiest county in Tennessee, and has the best public schools in the state (which is why our DIL wanted to live here), but we have paid more to live here, especially through the local sales tax which is nearly 10%. Tennessee may have no state income tax, but as we discovered, a whole lot of other ways to collect money from you.

Politically, Tennessee and Williamson County have been very difficult places for Brett and I to live. I won’t say much about that except that I’ve never lived where the state legislature has done nothing in four years to help anyone in the state except for millionaires/billionaires, fanatic Trump fans, and themselves. Most memorable to me during our time here was the legislature voting to make it legal for teachers to be armed in public schools – YIKES! Thankfully, not one school district in the state took them up on that proposal. August was also traditionally a sales tax-free month for groceries but the legislature voted to take that away this year. They also gave Elon Musk permission to build a tunnel from the state capitol building in downtown Nashville to the airport with only Teslas allowed to be driven in the tunnel. The tunnel idea has since been abandoned, most likely for geological reasons, and no idea where the money went. It’s not that there are no Democrats or liberals in the state or legislature either – there are actually plenty – but the entire state of Tennessee has been gerrymandered to the point that they are unable to ever earn a majority or get anything through the legislature. Our voting district was recently gerrymandered to contain half of Memphis – the district now stretches from the southwest corner to our county in central Tennessee, covering a distance of nearly 300 miles! All this has been depressing to say the least. We have looked for the good while we’ve been here and found it now and again, but more often than not the good has been overwhelmed by the not-so-good and the downright bad.

I have also been in constant battle with Tennessee weather since the day we arrived. Summers are miserably hot and humid (my nemesis), winters cold and dreary, and spring and fall only seem to last a couple of weeks in between. And then there have been the allergens. I have never suffered from hay fever until we arrived here but suffer here I have, and in a big way. I ended up just avoiding going outside as much as possible. I will not miss the climate here in any shape or form.

Brett and I left Tennessee the first time back in November of 1979 when Brett finished instructor duty at NAS Memphis (in Millington, just north of Memphis). As we headed west to our next duty station and crossed the Mississippi River we vowed to never return – we had had our fill of Tennessee.

But we came back, for a very good reason this time, and have no regrets about doing that. We are saying goodbye to Tennessee once again but we mean it this time when we say we’re not coming back. It’s just not for us.

P.S. The state of Tennessee may not be for us, but it gave us all the best: Dolly Parton. May she rest in peace, on her bed of soft cotton.