I am curious about this and have been for a while. I graduated from college six years ago and in that time I have lived in seven different cities. I have gone from Boston to Salt Lake City to Paris, then London, then Boston again, then San Francisco, Atlanta, and now Providence. Is this part of my ADD? Or is it just the writer in me craving new experiences? It is closing in on Fall here in the Northeast and I got the bug again and am planing on moving back to San Francisco. I have made many good friends over the years but I never stick around long enough to let relationships (especialy with women) to fully develop. I am still in my twenties and always tell myself that i will grow out of this or find the place that i am truly meant to be but careare wise I am starting to get woried, even though I make most of my cash freelancing for magazines and from book royalties I worry about my future. I want children someday and hope that i am not sabotoshing my future for selfish reasons. I just dont know anymore and i feel like nowere is home. I hope i find that home someday and fufill my dream of meeting the right woman and having a family and yet the urge comes like clockwork and never lets up until I uproot myself and leave for parts unknown.
Pith

yep, I do that too. I think it's hard to say what causes it; in my case it could be the ADD, or the depression, or the wanting to get far far away from the family, or some combination thereof.

I had psychotherapy, and my nice therapist tried in vain to help me see that I was repeating childhood patterns, trying to run away from my family, trying to prove I could do it on my own, etc. etc. None of this valuable info stuck, and I kept moving around.

In my case, I have finally moved around enough, and am just about ready to go home--but when I do, I'll have learned a lot more about the world and myself than I would have had I simply stayed put all those years.

Having said that, I don't have a relationship or family. For awhile I wanted one, and worried about the future, like you're doing now. But now I realize that I don't really want that. I could be just telling myself that--but if that's the case, it's never too late to meet someone and have a family. No time limit, really. And I'm the one with the rapidly-ticking biological clock!

Maybe think about why you want to keep leaving. It sounds like you can support yourself, so job/having enough food to eat etc. aren't the real issues, are they? Also, rethink your wanting a family--is moving around going to prevent this? are you waiting for the right woman to come along and anchor you? or do you perhaps not want a family as much as you think you do?

Just rhetorical questions to think about. I'm from the Northeast, and would give my eye-teeth (not really) to be there this time of year. Every year I get wicked (ahem) bummed that I don't live there to enjoy the fall leaves and great snowy cold winters. I always promise myself that I'll live there someday. Of course, I'm 7,000 miles away this year, but someday...

As someone once said, wherever you go, there you are; you're undoubtedly learning about yourself, even if all you have right now is questions. Some folks never even question things! Can you imagine??

Anyway, good luck on your journeys. As long as you keep questioning, I think you'll eventually find where you want to stay.

Thanks for your reply. Yeah, Im sure that my moving is not just from one thing but the combonation of many. I am secure so that i can live (not well) but the problem always becomes health insurance. I so wish they would fix the system in this country but i usually end up taking some nowhere job and stick with it for about six months so that benifits kick in and then quit and pay the $300 for COBRA. Maybe not the best or most economical system but you do what you gotta do. And despite what some people think about writers (or artists in general) we dont sit around sipping champagne and meeting beautiful women, well maybe some do. I put in about a sixty hour work week
between my freelance work and on my own stuff each and every week but it keeps me fed both with food and it feeds my soul and i count my blessings every day that I get to do what I love for a living. Anyway i am getting off topic but my point was thanks for your insight and making me feel a little less alone in my wondering ways.
Pith

Hey dude...you're not alone.

Though I haven't moved that many times, I find that when I do move, it's a good thing. I like change, I like experiencing different places, and sometimes, moving helps me recover after I've burned all my bridges(or it just feels like it). I'm currently thinking about moving again, soon, and to somewhere very, very, very far away. Switzerland? French or Italian alps? New Zealand? I dunno, but somewhere far and very, very cool.

So long as you can support yourself and you're good at packing light, I see only positives in moving. If/when you find your spot, then worry about finding someone to spend some time with and have some kids. Or, you'll find someone on the way who'll make you stay somewhere, or, and this is rare, you'll find someone who wants to travel as much you...then you're set.

It'll happen. Don't stress it.

Pith...

I'd move every 2-4 years if I could. It's a wanderlust I know I inherited from my father (who I secretly think is ADD but would never, in a million years, admit it. I think his experience in the Navy in his late teens/early 20's helped him deal with the ADD.) Personally, I think it is part of the ADHD syndrome. I have, since I was born, lived in California, Georgia, back to No. Cal. then to So. Cal, then to England, back to No. Cal., then to So. Cal. then to Saudi Arabia, back to No. Cal., then to So. Cal, to Oklahoma then to So. Cal. then to No. Cal.

All by the time I was 24.

While living in No. Cal, I've moved 4 times in 15 years. All within Redding.

So move on young man....especially if you're a writer. Look at what Jack London did when he was told to write what he knew. He went out and experienced most of what he wrote about. Not a bad way to live.

Now, if I could just convince my wife and kids we need to be gypsies.... ;)

Eric

well, I can relate to all of you..although I have been living in my current house in Sacramento for 2 1/2 years...my longest stay that I have lived anywhere(on my own). I have lived in about 5 citites in the bay area, also in Atlanta, Ga(which I loved). I think I move fairly frequently because I need a change of scenery...or maybe its because I don't have much of a social life and I think by moving and starting over with new friends would be a better way to go....I don't know!? I'm a confused man!

Lostdog, I was just up in Redding last month...visiting my brother. A little to "boony" for me...love Mt. Shasta though....some good fishing around the area as well. How do you like it? I assume you are married? I'm single, so no chance I would move there.

Cameron...

When my wife and I moved to Redding from Southern California in 1990, Redding was "boony". Very "boony". Everything but the movie theater closed on Sunday at 5p. The last movie started at 7p. Now we have everything from Starbucks to 24-hours grocery stores to Costco to Gottschalks. We have more pizza parlors and lawyers per capita than any other city in California.

It's still small townish enough for us, especially when we visit family in So. Cal.

Of course my kids (age 13 and 11) inform us quite a bit that when they grow older and move away, they are headed straight for the big city in So. Cal. I laugh and tell them, fine, but in a few years you'll be back, looking for a place like Redding to raise a family!

Eric

I haven't made long distance moves, all within probably a 40 mile radius, but I have lived in 6 different dwellings in 2.5 years, and 10 in the last 6 years. I find that I tire of a place fairly easily and just need to be somewhere else. Moving does that.

Wherever you go, there you are: Yep, truer words never spoken.

I have run all over the world trying to escape my screwed up brain. After the upteenth move I realized that if I was going to have to keep my brain company it might as well be in a decent place, so I settled down here in Okinawa. It's hard to describe how grateful I am to my wife for being willing to put up with my wanderlust, and then settle in such an ulikely place.

Now, I feel semi-permanently rooted here. Like I might be able to live here until my son graduates high school, or at least until we have enough equity in the house that it is worth selling... :)

But with recent problems with my son's school, we were seriously thinking about moving to Guam, or maybe Thailand. So I guess I'll see if these roots are deep enough to keep us tethered all that time.

I have worked in different parts of the US for short periods of time, but not full fledge moved. I always talk about moving somewhere warmer when I get older. I am 24 now! Just bought a condo, plan to stay for a few years. I do love to travel though and explore. So I guess that is kinda like moving....sorta!

I've moved around a bit, lived in the Middle East for years. But when I had my daughter I decided she would need a fixed abode here in the USA, stability, etc. This moving around seems to be part of the ADD--we want novelty, stimulation, even to some extent problems that we can solve. At least that's been a way my life has gone--if there's a choice to make I always chose the most difficult thing--like marrying someone from a completely different culture with whom I had almost nothing in common.

I have my own business because I got so sick of working in the same office five days a week, seeing the same people, the same four walls, doing the same thing every day, year round. Now I spend a lot of time driving around to clients' (gotta cut down on that with gas prices what they are) and am enjoying it.

The job I liked the most I sometimes went around helping people with their computers--just windows user questions, I'm not an IT person--and sometimes felt like a bouncing rubber ball--but loved the stimulation, thinking about different things all the time, going from this to that. It wasn't so good for my actual job, but I needed the mental variety. Now I'm self-employed, making less money but happier.

I'd read about this when I was researching ADD, but it's different seeing other peoples' problems with it and how we're all dealing with it in different ways. Now I see it as a problem, something to be solved, and I have my business and a house that keep me here in one place, but at the same time my business gives me the variety and contact with different people I need. I noticed several people here mentioned working in public, at coffee shops, supermarkets, as being satisfying. I can see that. But it seems that being a writer wouldn't give you that kind of variety, so maybe the moving around is the outlet for that need.

I have itchy feet and want to move all the time. About 3 years is the most I can handle it. My husband is military and I actually wish he had a job that moved us around every few years as it would suit me to a T. My Dr says that it is because I feel more comfortable in a unstable, crazy environment which moving a family certainly does cause. Unfortunately it seems I will be stuck in my current town for atleast the next 6 years. It is going to be a long road.

Yeah, I move a lot-- I'm 25, and since I graduated from college, I've moved a bunch of times--usually holding a job in each place (if you look at my resume, its crazy) Anyways, in the last year, I've lived in Michigan, Arkansas, Boston (my home base) and now I'm near San Francisco...interviewing for jobs, and I think I'll stay :-) SF is just like Boston minus the cold :-D

But, moving pays off-- my parents lived in 8 or 9 countries, and thanks to them, I'm a triple citizen, b/c I was born after they aquired all these passports :-)

Im always wanting to move,I want to get to that comfortable place.