The List

While I am quite happy with my simple MFA degree, my (future) husband is not. So (unless we're lucky and he gets into UT) chances are we'll be moving next summer so that he can get his Phd in Literature. We've been throwing around schools and locations for a while now, and have come up with a wide range of schools (average to really tough lit programs) in a variety of cities where we wouldn't mind living. There was some give and take in this list (Kansas and Rochester will be hard sells), each of us picked a school by our respective families. And if Brian leaned towards programs with mountains of some type nearby, who am I to argue?

Anyway, here's the list:

Boulder, CO--University of Colorado
Minneapolis, MN--University of Minnesota
Rochester, NY--Rochester University
Lawrence, KS--University of Kansas
Eugene, OR--University of Oregon
Austin, TX--University of Texas
Ann Arbor, MI--University of Michigan
Knoxville, TN--University of Tennessee

There are goods and bads about all the places on the list...Boulder is my dream town, but expensive, Minneapolis is cool, but cold. Rochester is really cold, but beautiful, Kansas is kinda boring, but close to Brian's family and friends (and my favorite band plays there all the time!). Oregon would be cool, but expensive and very far away from our families. Texas would involve no moving, and I could keep my current job, but we've already been here for five years, and I'm ready to move somewhere new. Michigan is close to my family, but I've lived in Michigan already. And Tennessee would be be close to mountains, but I've heard the pollution is awful.

So we'll see what happens. I told Brian as long as we could rent a house and get a dog, I'd be happy. It'll be an adventure. And if we end up not liking wherever we end up, we'll be moving again in three or four years.