Denver; thoughts, questions and concerns...

It has been 9 months since I have moved to the beautiful state of Colorado. The state really is gorgeous if you don't live in Denver, no one tells you that Denver is equivalent to living in Kansas/Nebraska/(insert flat mid-west state here), it is flat and hot and dry (that said from someone that used to live in Phoenix). When I started entertaining the idea of a move to Colorado, I was thinking mountains, pine trees, and wildlife. I was very disappointed when I entered the state and started crying "no one told me I was moving to Kansas!" that is an exact quote. So how do you get around the fact that you, a west-coaster, is now a mid-westerner? How do you embrace the mid-west, a place you intentionally stayed out of, unless you are going to a family reunion in Missouri (pronounces Missour-ah, for all you west-coasters).

The answer is, you head to the mountains (approximate drive time, 1 1/2 - 4 hours, depending on traffic (always), road conditions (mostly closed) and accidents (a ton, apparently mid-westerners cannot drive in the snow, big surprise huh?) there are tons of adorable mountain towns in this state, the real task is affording to visit them, live in them and get to them. So needless to say, my first Colorado winter although white was not exactly what I would call a wonderland. The couple times (2) I did make it up to the mountains, we either stayed in a condo for $500 a night, paid $85 per day per lift ticket and ate overprices mountain food or we woke up at 6 to get on the road to beat traffic to drive 2 hours (plus traffic and accidents and weather conditions drive time equaled 3.5 hours) to snowboard for 4 hours, before we had to leave the mountain early at 2 pm to miss traffic (to end up stranded on THE 70 (highway to the mountains, Coloradans call it I-70, apparently they can tell you are from the West Coast if you call any highway, freeway or interstate THE (fill in the blank with a number) for 4 more hours due to (traffic, accidents and weather) wow skiing in Colorado is so much fun!)

The lesson to my story is that just because you live in Colorado does not mean it is mountainous, cool (it is 100 today), relaxing or beautiful. You have to fight traffic for 4 hours to get to those parts of the state. Just an FYI in case you think you are moving to Denver to live in the mountains. I made that mistake before, now how do I afford to live in Aspen or Vail, those really are beautiful mountain towns...