Home Sweet Home: Hawaii Or Oklahoma?

I'm guessing it's cheaper to live in OK....but HI is...so tantalizingly perfect.

You know.... it's as if fate is playing dirty joke on me. Yup... I see it already.

Thing about HI, I have family there.
Thing about OK, I have family there, too.

In BOTH cases, I don't think I will be seeing much of the family.

IF it all came to a head and I end up in the gutter, I think HI would be the better choice.
No better place for a bum to soak in the sun.

In OK, I'd be able to have access to tribal healthcare which is supposed to be better than
what I presently have. In HI, none.

Oh yes, and property is much cheaper in OK than it is in HI.

Healthcare might be the huge selling point there.

Pick the beach. If you get sick, you can move back to the tornado.

No easy answers, here.

I can say this: Life was so much easier on the road, driving a truck.
You travel light, come in well balanced. Of course there's always the bad side of things.
You take the good and bare the bad.

The bad side of the road, from my vantage point, is that you live in solitary confinement
on wheels. It's NOT like a vacation. Always on the move. And far too little sleep.
You can't plan for anything. You don't know where you'll be the following week.
East coast, west coast maybe somewhere in between. The only thing you have to look forward
to is keeping your eyes on the road and the fact you'll end up right back where you started.
I can look back and recall one detail and come away with this truth: Paradise is shutting the diesel down.

I've also had the experience of solitary life wherein you can't move and every fiber of your being
wants to fly.

One man's paradise is another man's hell and woe to him who cannot tell the difference when given the choice.
Such is a vanity and vexation of spirit.

Posted by Rabbit
I don't envy your dilemma.

Having lived in Hawaii I know the allure.

Having lived in Kansas (similar to OK), I know how cruddy it can be at times.

Lived in Hawaii, myself, a long time ago.
Not nuts about it. The whole island is a traffic jam of sardines.

Same goes for OK.
Darn good reason why property is so cheap there.

My dilemma has a lot to do with the government more than just about anything else.

Now... as far as Indian healthcare goes, it's fubar. As far as Obamacare goes, it's more fubar.
HI is a place for consumers.
OK is a place for producers.
I am more producer oriented than I am consumer oriented. Self-reliance v. reliance.
When your nature is self-reliant and you are being forced into a state of reliance, that's when
deep inner conflicts begin. And when you know what I know, it doesn't make life any easier.

Posted by Rabbit
I recall the last time I visited Maui.

The parking spaces must have been about 3/4 of the size of an actual car :/

Politics is power. Nothing more.

Politicians want to save money when and where they can so they can spend it elsewhere. On pet projects
or themselves, if they are deviant enough.

Instead of developing more parking spaces on a larger scale, they choose to go the route of 3/4 sized car parking spaces. Hawaii was fine up until some time in last 35 years, when more people started moving there, on top of the existing native population boom. Add to that, the tourist aspect.
They also dumped the sugarcane and pineapple fields. A brilliant move to stimulate the economy.

Like everything else on the mainland, their share of stupidity is proportional to their population.
By no means am I attracted to the allure of HI's weather and lush greenery without regard to the more practical aspects that would make such a place a doable prospect.

I am pretty sure that one motive behind "3/4" sized parking spaces and no shoulders on the roads is the subliminal act of forcing people to buy compact economy cars, motorcycles and scooters. The other objective is to discourage driving as much as possible. - They have been trying to get a trolley system built - well, if that happens, the politicians stand to benefit. Meanwhile, a lot of jobs had gone bye-bye and there is only so much to see for the tourist economy.
Hawaii is a tourist place. Not for the "productive" working man.

No doubt the balmy weather and lush tropical environment is definitely an alluring factor, but it's about the only one that I can think of. IF I wasn't so driven by other factors, I'd give it serious consideration.

The trouble I have is that I am too industrial oriented. I need freedom to work.
And the cryin' shame of it all is that the mainland society of the US has done itself a great
disservice: It has sacrificed it's own industrial infrastructure.

Truely valuable skillsets are lost because the idiot society thought a fast-food Utopia was in their grasp.

The US is a sitting duck.
And Hawaii is a model state of that truth.
Not nuts about it and never have been.

In Hawaii, I could ride a motorcycle year round. In Oklahoma, it's seasonal.
In Hawaii, I could go sailing. In Oklahoma, I could shoot someone in the face. Yes, the face!
Just like Dick Cheney! No, wait a minute, Cheney shot his friend in the face. I think I got that right.

Damn!

What I'd really like to do is stay right where I am and win the lottery.

Of course, we never get what we want but..... it's lunch time and I've got a hankerin' for some Steak-Fries and ketchup and a Philly Cheese steak Sammy just like they hand out at the old truck stop cafes.

Hmmmm, Will have to hunt down some Greek Gyros in my town. I seriously doubt they have any Greeks in OK.
Hawaii might have some Asians dressed up like a crowd of Greeks, but I am too smart for that.... hmmmmm.. which reminds me....

Property in OK is probably so cheap because there are so many tornados and brutal thunderstorms, you can't count on a house to last long.

Hawaii would be perfect, IMO, but you're not only confined to that state unless you fly, you are trapped on an island...which is usually packed with tourists. Blah! I'd feel so claustrophobic.

Plus it's super expensive there overall because tourism jacks up prices, and everything has to be imported.

except maybe coconuts and seafood. yum...I actually wouldn't mind living on coconuts and scallops. 😛

What's wrong with staying where you are if that's what you'd rather do?

Sometimes, we are given choices that are not ours to make. We have to go along for the ride..... for better or worse. Sometimes, we must wait until a tertiary choice is offered. Of course, one could
be wrong in waiting for such a third option.

Sometimes, no matter how hard one tries, the reality comes that old things must come to pass before new things can begin.

Old things must be thrown away. Discarded like worthless trash. Sometimes, we realize it was trash to begin with. That's all it ever was. Disposable garbage.

For me to make such a choice, I MUST destroy everything that I am.
Erasing everything. Desire, expectations, hopes, dreams and plans,
the very habits which one builds their lives, must cease. They too must be erased.
Like a bad cigarette habit, those fundamental things can be very hard to break.

One would think that such actions are appropriate for one who is near death.
No one knows the time of one's own passing. Some are taken unexpectedly while others
see that train comin' their whole adult lives and are acutely aware of the inevitable.

Hmmmmm.

You're right and also not exactly right. Maybe it's the Cancer in me and a healthy dose of self preservation because of it, but to destroy everything you are is to say you were a mistake. Wouldn't it be better to just destroy the bad parts and keep the good?

So be a Phoenix, Mr.Firebird.

Burn down your world, emerge from the flames and fly to the beach.

Don't you have any Sag planets? Just look upon this as a great adventure 🙂

Or not.

I've lived my entire life in Hawaii. I grew up there.
Let me tell you some things first of all, Hawaii might seem perfect but we have a lot of issues here. Such as the insane prices on everything. If you plan on living in Hawaii, be prepared to pay practically twice the cost for groceries thanwhat you normally would spend in mainland US. We always get the short end of the stick due to the fact that everything has to be imported. 5 dollar foot longs at subway? Nonexistent here. Gas prices are insane too.

Speaking of gas and cars, the traffic here is crazy. Our speed limits are at 60 mph on the highway, you may feel very suffocated by this. Because this is an island and there's not much space, the roads are always congested.

Finding a place to live here will be costly. Let me give you an estimate. A tiny 1 bedroom house-rented will cost you over 1000 dollars a month on average, not including water or electricity.

Also, traveling outside of the state may be an annoyance. When you live in the mainland, its easy to just drive over to the next state. Obviously not the case here. The closest state to us is california and that's 6 hours by plane. Just to keep it in mind if you're someone who vacations or goes on trips often.

Not trying to shatter the dream because Hawaii is still a pretty nice place to live, but I just want to make sure you know the realities before you think about moving here. Contrary to popular belief, not everything is paradise here. We don't sip on cocktails at the beach everyday, I'll tell you that!

Well, there's your answer Mr.Phoenix. Move to California - it's not as expensive/clogged as HI and you still have a beach 😄

*forgot to mention that in town the speed limits are around 35 mph. 60 mph is the fastest you'll get here. But usually you're looking at 35-55 mph. I just thought you should know since a lot of my friends who have moved here from the mainland often complained about this!

Posted by Wynter
Well, there's your answer Mr.Phoenix. Move to California - it's not as expensive/clogged as HI and you still have a beach 😄

—

Ever been to LA? Lol!

And in SF...I damn near wanted to sleep on a park bench when I was there for a summer internship. 2500 minimum to sublet a shithole 0br/0.5ba studio in el barrio. And even that was difficult because renters were fighting for it.

What about Utah, Mr. FB? Very beautiful there, and I don't think it's in Tornado Alley.

Well, LA and SF are obviously going to be expensive and congested....that goes for NYC, etc, too. Most states, especially the ones with lots of space, like CA and TX, have places that aren't so congested and aren't overly expensive.