I started this blog many years ago to chronicle our move from our long-standing home in Northern Virginia to a new adventure in Kansas City. Mostly it was meant to keep me sane but it was also helpful to share info with those who wished to keep track of our attempts at being empty nesters in a new place, far from our decades of past life.

Fast forward more than half a decade and we have moved on from out original move and are ready to do it again. I never thought of myself as “flighty” or someone who feels the need for constant change but here we are: ready to do our 3rd move in 8 years. And this one is a doozy – a transatlantic move to Aberdeen, Scotland. A kind of homecoming for Frank and a long awaited dream for me.

After the challenges of COVID and some professional changes and disappointments, we’ve decided it’s time for a different kind of move. We have been pondering a move to Scotland for nearly a year and even did a scouting expedition in February, looking to see what it might be like to retire there in a few years. Then an opportunity for a full time academic position presented itself and it was too good to pass up. We didn’t intend to move just yet but when Robert Gordon University offered me the position of Lecturer of Business Analytics in the School of Creative and Cultural Business, it was too good to pass up. The job description looks like it was written for me: teaching analytics and data governance, helping to define the future of analytics education as well as maintaining my industry and professional associations. We had some hurdles to get over in terms of timing as they wanted me to start in September and I couldn’t make that work and keep my sanity. So we worked out a January start and now it’s time to get things moving!

Frank’s big professional change is very different: he’s decided to retire. After 40+ years of working with automobiles, hoisting engines, cutting metal, wiring electronics, and other activities that take a toll on the human body, he says he is done. (Snickering is entirely appropriate BTW. Not sure how long this will last!) There’s no way that he’ll stop being a car guy but he no longer wants that to be his main activity between 9 and 5. But like lots of things about this transition, we’ll see how it unfolds.

We certainly couldn’t have done this on our own. I owe a debt of gratitude and thanks to the friends and colleagues who have have helped me figure this out. Both the handwringing zoom discussions and the wine-fueled dreaming have been incredibly beneficial to me (but maybe not to my liver!). I’ve been blessed to have had a choice of options and think that we have made the right choice – at least for now. One thing that I have learned over the last decade is that I can’t assume anything is permanent. So for those who are saddened by our departure, don’t think of it as a final farewell but instead we’re thinking of it as a secondment – we’re giving it at least 3 years and then we’ll figure out what makes sense.

But the preparations for these next 3 years are pretty intense! Unlike the past two moves, this one doesn’t involve stuffing everything in a truck and then arranging it in a different location. Instead, this is a “clean slate” move: we are getting rid of EVERYTHING and starting over. Yes, we’ll keep some personal stuff that we’ve accumulated over the last 30 years. But the furniture and flotsam and jetsam we have acquired over the decades all must go. We downsized considerably when moving from VA to KC but even that pales in comparison to this round.

So our house has been listed for sale and we are heading out to Aberdeen to scout out neighborhoods, meet with my new colleagues, and just get familiar with our new home. If this were a vacation, we’d tell the tales on the Cannon Family Travel Blog but it’s not. We intend to relax and enjoy ourselves but there is work to be done for my consulting practice, relocation arrangements, and course prep for online teaching this fall. Therefore, it seemed more appropriate to document things here – again mostly for my sanity but also to help give more detail to what may seem to be bewildering Facebook and Twitter posts for those who are interested.

If you want to follow along, we’ll be here. If not, wish us well and come visit when you can.