If I lived in my hometown, my concern would be the coming of winter in just a few months and how I would get snow tires on and the driveway shoveled to be able to drive to Wegman’s for groceries.

Living here, my concern is when I’m ever going to get my garage empty so I can put my car in it.

If I lived in my hometown, I would have retired years ago on a paid-off mortgage and reasonable property taxes, and the savings would allow us to travel even more than we do now.

Living in northern California, we make tradeoffs for the ability to live in the lovely, airy but not too-large, million-dollar definitely-not-luxurious house we bought last year.

If we lived in our hometown, our weekends would include driving a 4WD SUV through the fall colors, a rental cottage on a Finger Lake, frequent trips to New York City and lots of wood for the fire place.

Living here, we hang out in San Francisco, the Monterey peninsula and wonder when we’re going to be able to use the fire pit we bought months ago.

Living in Rochester, we would think Florida is paradise.

Having lived in Florida and now living in Northern California, we know that we live in the real paradise.