Thoughts on the First Year in Portland

The View from the Schoening's Back Yard

To be honest, it isn't quite a year... we headed south on June 29, 2015. But it's been an eventful year, nonetheless, and the last few days of extremely hot, summery weather has made me think about the year in review, and how I feel about our first year in Portland.

I don't know what I expected from moving this time... I knew Portland would be less expensive than Vancouver BC (because really, almost nowhere is more expensive than Vancouver BC), and I'd heard that although it is getting tougher to be a working musician in Portland than it once was, it was still a pretty good place to develop a career.

And Portland hasn't disappointed on that front. Within a year, Adam and I have:

1. Released an album
2. Had a successful album release party
3. Started our own music school, which is picking up steam
4. Found so much teaching work that we're already at the point of being able to pick and choose which jobs to take (and being able to streamline our teaching schedules to have a little more time off
5. Booked paying gigs not only for JPJQ, but also with other projects - I've got more paying gigs this summer alone than I had in the last 2 years in Vancouver!
6. Built up my US credit to the point that we qualified for the next two items:
7. Found an apartment (we move in mid-June)
8. Bought a late model used car that has plenty of room for us, and the bass, runs great and looks pretty splashy! 

Of course, it hasn't been all sunshine and roses in sunny Rose City. As you know, I lost my mom this year and I feel her absence every day and with every piano student I teach. I miss her deeply, and I wish she were here to see our successes in our new home. 

We've been able to take our time and make intelligent choices about our business because of the incredible generosity of Adam's mom, Sarah, and his stepdad, Mark, who opened their home to us, supported us emotionally and financially as we navigated this first year, and continue to give us the benefit of their advice and love (and gourmet groceries). We are both so grateful for everything they've done for us... but we're very ready to move into our new place and start feeling like grownups again!

Almost everyone in Portland is aware of the "housing crisis" in this city, and while I occasionally want to tell them, "Oh, poor baby... try being a musician and trying to rent an apartment in Vancouver!" I do acknowledge that the rental market here is tight, much more expensive than a few years ago, and very competitive, with minimal protections for the prospective tenant. That said, we were able to find a big apartment in a close(ish) suburb for a reasonable price, and no one batted an eye about our being musicians/teachers, as long as we could prove we could afford the rent. Of course I haven't actually seen the inside of the apartment yet... (that's where the competitiveness comes in... if you see something within budget you just have to jump on it)!

And cars - don't even get me started! Oh, wait... I started this myself... well then...

We arrived in Portland in a Hyundai which proved to be impossible to import, so we took it back to Canada, sold it to a friend (and took a bath on the Canadian-US exchange rate) and bought a cheap station wagon that fit all our stuff, which then actually, literally exploded (the engine, anyway) in the middle of a holiday weekend. Cue the inlaws to the rescue, getting us to the rest of our appointments on the weekend, until we could rent a car (for car shopping) and ultimately buy another Hyundai. (Which we don't plan to try to import to Canada... as long as Trump doesn't win!)

All in all, we've seen a lot of success this year... and while I have zero desire to go through a year like this again, I'm proud of what we've accomplished and feel extremely lucky to be where I am. (And I bet I'll feel even more lucky to be where I am in about 10 days, when "where I am" is at my desk in our new apartment! (Or even better, sitting out by the pool with a margarita!)