“Why Don’t You Just Move?”

I’ve lived in New York State all my life.  I have family here; my job is here; I have responsibilities and obligations that tie me to the region.  While I’m not fan of the harsh winters, I’m happy to live somewhere that has few natural disasters and only brief periods of insect life each year. I’m accessible to wonderful resources in terms of shopping, education opportunities, training, martial arts, and just about anything else I could want or need.

I hate my state.

I hate my state because it is ruled by power-mad leftists.  I hate my state because the pendulous tumor that is New York City clings to the belly of New York like a remora, bullying Upstate’s voters with its dense population base and forcing the rest of the state to cater to its whims. I hate my state because, in the dead of night, our governor suspended by fiat the requirement for debate and comment on new legislation, ramming his sweeping gun ban down our throats with almost no discussion or disclosure.  The new law effectively makes second-class citizens of all gun owners, registering them and their ammo purchases while outlawing all modern semi-automatic pistols (by banning even ten-round magazines).

I used to really enjoy recreational shooting.  I possess a great deal of close-quarters firearms training.  I took all that training right here in New York State.  There’s very little chance I will be able to do so again.  Even if I ran handgun classes with a revolver or carbine classes with a lever-action rifle, I’d be unable to buy ammunition in the quantity I needed.  I will be reduced to training with airsoft and laser training pistols for the foreseeable future.  This will have a significant impact on my lifestyle.  Knowing this, I sold all my firearms in anticipation of these dark times.

People living in other states, “free” states (the number of which is dwindling as more states enact their own gun and magazine bans), often say to me, “Why don’t you just move?”  They say this blithely, casually, as if it’s the obvious solution to an obvious problem.  This attitude has never made any sense to me.

There may, in fact, be people who have so few responsibilities, so much liquid cash, and so many contacts in other states that moving from one end of the country to its middle is a viable option.  I don’t happen to be one of them.  Even if I did not have obligations that tie me to this area, exactly how does one quickly find a new job in a new state where one has never lived?

Try finding ANY job in this economy, in Obama’s environment of malaise and uncertainty, much less exactly the job you want at the pay level you require.  Then there are the logistics.  It isn’t cheap to move down the street, depending on your lease or mortgage obligations.  Multiply the expense many times to go from one state to another.

The money isn’t the issue, though.  I could pay to move.  I could absorb all the costs.  I’ve even learned well enough, over the years, that I will gladly throw money at gorillas with trucks rather than try to move all my junk myself when it comes to furniture and so on.  This would be money well spent.  But it wouldn’t change the fact that to leave the state I’d have to have a job waiting for me elsewhere… and I’d have to have no family or economic responsibilities here in New York.  I have more options than most when it comes to the former.  Any lifetime New Yorker is all too aware of the latter.

Those of you who live in free states, I envy you.  I hope Obama doesn’t manage to do to you at the federal level what has already been done to me in my state.  I appreciate that you care about me and want me to be free and happy.  In many cases I do, in fact, wish I could come join you.  The fact is, however, that moving is not an option for me at this time.  This is true for many New Yorkers.  When you tell us to “just move,” you are being insulting, although I realize you don’t mean it that way.

I would love to escape from New York.  It simply isn’t something I can do right now.  We’ll see what the future brings, but until then, I will remain a prisoner of the Empire State.  Telling me casually to walk out the front gate doesn’t change my situation in any way.