Never in twenty-eight years did I dream that one day I would leave my home state of Idaho to venture out, explore and call another place in the United States home. Having been born and raised in the small town of Twin Falls Idaho, I thought that moving to Boise (the capital of Idaho) almost 4 years go was one of the scariest things I had ever done.

Don’t get me wrong, Idaho is a beautiful state. Idaho has a lot to offer when it comes to not being very crowded, it has a low cost of living, and it has numerous beautiful places up in the mountains. But the few things that Idaho is missing is the lack of culture, lack of openness for LGBTQ people and the ability to travel very easily to very many destinations via a direct flight.

As you know Brandon and I live to travel. We are always going somewhere and the funny part about that is we took a last minute trip to Austin in February of 2018 for the weekend. I had worked a bunch of extra hours at work and needed to take a few days off. Brandon asked me if I wanted to go to Austin as we had both heard nothing but great things.

In fact we had heard that Austin was a lot like Boise but just on a much bigger scale. We decided to check it out for ourselves. During our weekend visit here we ate, we drank, we explored, we stayed at the Historical Driskill Hotel and we were constantly reminded that it felt a lot like home (Boise, Idaho).

Even though it was a quick weekend trip, we discovered that the people in Austin were so friendly, there was so much to do, there was tons of great food to eat and we fell in love with the city. We said to ourselves on our flight home, we could see ourselves living in Austin someday. But there were no plans other than someday.

Throughout the following months of 2018, we did a lot of soul searching, planning for our future and asking ourselves what things we wanted to achieve in life. Fast-Forward to November of 2018. The real estate market in Boise was performing quite well, so we decided to put our home up for sale so we could buy a condo in Downtown Boise. Our house sold on the first day, and we had 2 weeks to move.

We found a temporary place to live in Boise, and then we really started asking each other if we wanted to stay in Boise or move somewhere else. The more we talked about it, the more we kept exploring the idea of moving out of Idaho. In fact for about a three week period of time, I kept finding houses everyday and would send them to Brandon while he was at work. These houses were in no specific place but a few of the cities were Portland, Seattle, Scottsdale and Austin.

Having visited Scottsdale almost every year since we have been together, it was at the top of my list. A few weeks went by and at the point I was rooting to Scottsdale and Brandon was rooting for Austin. They are both great places to live and we knew that either one of them would be a definite change for us.

In about December of 2018, I decided that if we were going to move we needed to find new jobs. I started looking for jobs in both Scottsdale and Austin and said if I can get a job in one of the cities, it might help us narrow down where we wanted to move to. I found several jobs in Austin and applied for them. At this point, I wasn’t sure we would actually be able to line everything up and make it happen.

I found a dream job that I applied for in Austin and the whole time I told myself that I wasn’t sure I would actually get it. To make a long story short I went through the interview process for this job and was blown away when I got the phone call offering me the job. Brandon and I talked about our options and decided that this job offer and a move to Austin is exactly what we had been looking for.

We planned a return visit in March of 2019 over Brandon’s birthday weekend to come visit one more time and just make sure of our decision. We explored more of the city, we ate more delicious food, we encountered more friendly people and we fell in love with the city all over again.

While we were in Austin, we looked for a place to live and after looking at the first 3 or 4, it was hard because nothing compared to the house that we sold. We were both starting to get a little worried if we would be able to find a place to live but after a whole day of searching, we found a new place to call home.

As we were traveling back to Idaho, I had been talking to my family and letting them know we had put everything together to move to Austin. During our flight from Austin to Salt Lake City, I was texting my dad and sent him pictures of the city, and pictures of Austin. I never heard back from my dad that night and I figured he was trying to process it all and take it all in. Needless to say the next day I found out he had passed away peacefully in his home. My dad always told me one thing in life and that was he wanted to live until I grew up and became successful.

He got his wish, with him learning about our move to Austin, what it would do for my career, and the opportunities we had ahead of us. I miss my dad everyday but I am so happy to know that he got to live to see his wish.

We have now been settled in Austin for a couple of months and we still can’t believe that we live here. Thanks to all of our friends and our families for supporting our new adventure in Texas!

See Y’all later!

-Nick