Port Townsend

I'm seriously debating with myself whether I should move to Seattle or Port Townsend. There are advantages and disadvantages to both.

*Seattle's become a big, ugly, noisy, crowded city, but it's got great energy and it's right in the middle of civilization, on the main corridor between L.A. and all points north. Port Townsend is a beautiful and serene small town, but it's stuck way out on the tip of the Olympic Peninsula, cut off and isolated from the mainstream. To reach civilization from there you have to take a boat or two.

In times of infrastructural stress, should they occur, involving food and/or fuel shortages, places like Seattle would be supplied in order to forestall civil unrest, but places like Port Townsend would be thrown back on their own resources.

*There's a lively, accessible arts scene in Port Townsend. There is in Seattle too, but people there often seem too busy to pay attention.

*Rents are cheaper in Port Townsend, but it's not entirely walkable as many Seattle neighborhoods are.

The photograph shows downtown Port Townsend's Victorian skyline, with the ferry sailing off to Whidbey Island and its tiny port of Keystone in the background. I imagine living there would be sort of like living in Venice, Italy.

The town suffers a bit from cute overload and boutiquification, and it makes much of its living from the summertime tourist trade. But it's a great, manageable size, and I'm leaning toward it, as I prefer peace and quiet to the noise and congestion of the big city.