At lunch with some retired folks here in Williamsburg, Virginia I asked “Don’t you miss your friends back in D.C.?” No, they replied, “We went to William and Mary [the local liberal arts college] and 21 of our friends from school have retired here as well. We have more friends here in Williamsburg than we do back where we lived when we were working.”
College is the time when a lot of people form their closest friendships. Perhaps it makes sense to pick a college based on whether the town is a reasonable retirement destination.
Duke and UNC Chapel Hill are good (warm weather, cheap housing). Yale is bad (high-crime neighborhood, cold weather). Harvard and MIT are bad ($2 million fixer-upper houses, cruel winters). Any school in Florida is prime!
You mean… I’m *doomed* here in W. Michigan?
Now that is a great concept that I never have thought of! It makes such perfect sense as I find the schools that I “wish I had gone to” are the in towns that I would love to “eventually move to”… Good call! 🙂
I always wondered why my college town had so many retired folk living in it…what true insight you have!
That makes sense, although at the time I didn’t have much money so I picked my school based on “how close were they to home.” SJSU was on the bus line from my dad’s house.
I’ve read this is a documented phenomenon.
Hey, how long are you in Williamsburg? I live here and have read parts of your book, so if you’re speaking at William and Mary (where I’m taking a few classes), or are just around town, I’d be really interested in meeting you.
As a Duke alum, I can tell you that Durham, NC is a lot better place today than it was in 1971, especially with liquor by the drink, great restaurants, and excellent basketball.
The best choice – Stanford. You’ve got your sunny idyllic college years at Stanford, your young and hip years in San Francisco.
Then you can pick you get to settle down to a life style, not one but three:
To Berkeley to live in a coop and eat organic food.
To the South Bay to be a tech drone.
To Marin to raise your kids away from the poor people and play golf.
Then retire in Santa Cruz.
Heh–traffic in Santa Cruz is lousy, and housing prices are among the highest in California. But UCSC is a fine school, especially for the sciences, not to mention the most beautiful college campus in the world….
Santa Cruz? Oh I beg to differ.
Nowhere but South Bend, IN., is where I’d like to spend my waning days (UND). Shoot, if I felt like I was spending my last days there when I was 18, then aging terminally there couldn’t be far from having aged terminally already.
Obviously I jest.