Ben Gallant (@benrgallant)

Two weeks ago we moved our family from California to Tennessee, and today confirmed everything we hoped for. We watched our new community’s Fourth of July parade and ran the neighborhood 5k this morning, and tonight there’s a fireworks show, all without leaving the neighborhood. The kids on our street already pulled our two boys into their bike club. Neighbors met the moving truck and helped unload before we even arrived. We’re buying meat and cheese from a farm fifteen minutes from our house. We came here for the community, and for a place built for raising a family instead of one that seems to punish you for it. We loved California, but every year felt like paying a tax for having kids, wanting safe streets, and trying to run a small business, even with family nearby to help. Today I’m grateful to live in a country where you can pack up and choose a different life, and where the people who live there actually want you to have it. This country is great, and I’ll never stop being grateful for it.