The Daily Mail (U.K.) runs a story about an American director of a Japanese firm, a fellow with 7 kids, who moved to Austin, TX, from CA, didn’t like it, and moved back. I found his reasons fairly shallow, but have had somewhat the same experience.
Brett Alder, the man in question, complained TX was a “conservative dystopia,” a “monoculture,” and had terrible weather (compared to CA). He griped about “terrible service,” bad car washes, lack of places to hike, etc. Meh.
The DrsC spent a year in TX and left. There were reasons we don’t especially recommend it, and I’ll share them with you. We lived in the greater Dallas area. For people (us) who like mountains, it was flatter than an empty dining table and about as scenic.
Alder is correct that there is little time when being outdoors is comfortable. Winters, while not brutal, are somewhat colder than CA. Summers are as hot but much more humid which makes them more uncomfortable. So there might be a month in spring and another in fall when a TX patio would be pleasant, the rest of the time you’ll choose to be indoors.
Texans are superficially friendly people, naturally gracious. Does this mean you’ll make friends easily? Not unless you attend a church regularly. It is common for Texans to find their friends, people they’ll do things with, at church.
The concept of church and state separation is mostly theoretical in TX, in practice they’re in bed together. If like many moderns you aren’t a regular attendee at church, expect your interactions with Texans to remain “superficially friendly.” I suspect this is true throughout the South, but have only lived in TX.
If you read the DM article you’ll see Alder put his kids in a private school. Private schools are common for white city and suburban dwellers in TX, a cynic would call them segregation academies. Rural white TX kids are probably still in public schools.
The cost of living is low, the services are adequate, Texas certainly “works” on many levels. It has lots of land, it is bigger than either Spain or France. It looks visually like a California-without-scenery, but many aspects are South. It’s political conservatism didn’t bother us at all.
