Why live anywhere else?

We have a friend, a retiree – we call him “Bicycle Joe” – who pedals around town on his two-wheeler and stops to chat with friends old and new. He always has something interesting to say, but the thing that sticks with me the most is his appreciation from where he lives, here in Orange County.

On a sunny or a shaded day, he’ll make an expansive gesture. “Why would anyone want to live anywhere else?” Indeed.

Many of us know folks who have uprooted from the old neighborhoods and gone in search of their bliss somewhere else in the Fifty States, or even further.

Some went because their California home had enough equity to buy a palace and ranch in Wyoming or Tennessee. Some went for political reasons … only to find their previously reliable red or blue state is now quite purple. Some went to follow a career or grandchildren.

But leaving the OC also often means entering a world of hurricanes, blizzards, ice storms, sinkholes, alligators, floods, mosquitoes the size of a sparrow and other delights.

Some left to escape high property taxes to find either a) there are high sales taxes to make up for it or b) absent higher taxes, the roads, schools and living standards are a cut below.

But there’s more to it than that. October in the OC is the most sublime time of the year. It’s getting cooler; the leaves are starting to turn, and the approach of the holidays seems to make everyone and everything a little more convivial.

Sure, autumn and Christmas happen all over, but they are often accompanied by angry weather, slush-clogged roads and a well-reasoned desire to stay inside from November to March.

Bicycle Joe – and us – can wear our shorts on our bikes in January here. Why, indeed would anyone want to live anywhere else?