Comparing Cost of Living: Costa Rica Electric Bill at The Happier House —$300 | Electric Bill in North Carolina — $80

“You want a southern experience? Check out their apple festival,” the car salesperson says. “They have apple jerky, apple pie, applesauce, apple…”

I’ve never passed up a county fair or hayride. I’ll even stop on the side of a highway to witness the biggest ball of rubber bands or to enter a house shaped like a shoe. America may not have Europe’s lengthy history, with its spired cathedrals and cities buried under volcanic ash, but it has curiosity attractions.

We are somewhere on the border of Georgia and North Carolina, home to apple festivals, waffle houses, and Bigfoot. I don’t recall much about Bigfoot except a grainy film where, by all accounts, a man dressed like Chewbacca walks through the woods. But here, he is a media sensation with ten-foot silhouette cutouts placed aside the road, which scare the shit out of you while driving at night.

These folks love Bigfoot. Occasionally, we’ll pass a Sasquatch graffitied on the side of a building like a Banksy creation. Or discover a life-sized furry model positioned outside a gas station. Bigfoot even has his own museum in Cherry Log, Georgia, claiming “The World’s Largest! With 3700 sq feet of self-guided exhibits.” Self-guided? That’s unfortunate because I’d rather have a crusty old-timer show me around and explain why the Abominable Snowman has his own section, surely taking attention away from the headliner. And why is there a Bigfoot Museum in Georgia when the grainy film took place in Northern California? But alas, I keep my Yankee mouth shut which, for any Yankee, is hard to do.

I’m oddly attracted to the bizarre. I’ll stop at any roadside attraction that will ensure a mediocre experience. Preferably one with an eight-dollar admission and a bored teenager leaning against the register. The attraction should have a thin layer of dust, not enough to look unkept, but sufficient to remind you not to take any of this too seriously. The real profit is in the souvenirs which I will buy in excess.

I’m moving to the Smoky Mountains, searching for happiness the same way I did in Costa Rica. And like the Costa Rica move, Rob opened a map. But this time, instead of pointing to Central America, his index finger tapped on a tiny lake in North Carolina.

“How would you like to live on one of the cleanest lakes in the country?” he said.

We’ve been entertaining splitting our time in Costa Rica. Being a snowbird sounds attractive. I’ll be closer to my aging parents, which has taken a priority, especially after the pandemic that has mentally tumbled everyone’s brain in an industrial dryer. Everything has changed is putting it lightly. And I almost croaked from the virus, which is a story need not told.

We still have a property in Costa Rica that still doesn’t have legal water. Coincidently, it’s only a half-mile from The Happier House, but in a defunct development. If we could get that water letter, we’ll build a smaller vacation home. But to make this dream possible, we had to sell The Happier House. So off it went, feeling like an amputation, a piece of me gone forever.

“While we work on getting legal water, we could go here,” Rob had said while playing a YouTube video of Nantahala Lake. “It’s the prettiest place I’ve ever seen, and it looks exactly like the mountains of Costa Rica. And can you imagine living in the woods? Miles from any store? It’ll be great.”

It did look like Grecia, the tiny town that started our Costa Rica adventure. Rob found the next best thing, a lake nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains surrounded by rolling carpets of green that went on as far as the eye could see.

We’ve never been to North Carolina or lived anywhere in the South. And I’m not sure how South this area is. Is it sweet tea on the porch, South? Dolly Parton, South? Deliverance in the woods, South? Or are those just stereotypes, like how everyone assumes people from New Jersey have big mouths?

Change is scary, more so for me than Rob. He wants to live a hundred different lives. I’m okay with just a few. I need a push, and this push has taken me to the land of Big Foot and the Smoky Mountains. A place where I’m unsure if a couple from Brooklyn and Jersey will fit in.

But like phantom limb syndrome, I can still feel my Costa Rica life. I smell salty breezes and hear the distant call of howler monkeys. Memories so strong I’m not sure if I can ever be that happy again, and maybe I’ll always feel a little wounded no matter where I live.

And that’s when I meet a guy who was bit through his foot by a black bear…