Some people celebrate anniversaries with fancy dinners, bottles of wine, a little candle light. Maybe some champagne.

We celebrated ours with a veritable feast from Publix: brisket, Mac and cheese (with Old Bay, obviously), potato wedges, some tiny toast — as the kids call those small little slices of bread you can get in the bread section — and cheese.

Ours was no normal anniversary: Last night marked the beginning of our third October in Tallahassee, and we celebrated by eating the same thing we did on day one: Whatever looks good while roaming aimlessly around Publix

One of my favorite family traditions. 

Easily the most oft-asked question we have been asked since we moved here is “Do we like Tallahassee?” 

I’ll answer that with an image: I return home from work every day to two children dressed as Seminole Chiefs, and for no less than an hour, we run up and down the yard and plant spears (we have a literal spear, but they also use sticks or, currently, pumpkins, and call them spears) and howl the war chant to our neighbors. Those same kids call my “bosses,” if you could call them that, Auntie Brooke and Uncle Nick, and they see their three boys more than they do their actual cousins.

Yes, we adore this place. Love this place. More than we thought, and more every day, especially now that the weather is turning sublime.

Which brings us to most-oft-asked question number 2: How long do we think we’ll stay here?

As a rule, given my itinerant life journey up to this point, I don’t make plans. Long term plans are as useless to me as a 4th quarter lead is to the Ravens (those who know know). When we moved here, I figured if I enjoyed college coaching I’d do the coaching thing and climb the ladder by popping around, as coaches do: find a head coaching job at a mid-major, win a bit there, move up to the big leagues at a power program when the opportunity presented itself. 

Some of those mid-major opportunities have come up, and my own lack of interest in pursuing them was a bit of a shock to me. 

Delaney and I have a saying: “I guess we’ll settle for perfect.”

This place, these people, these coaches, this team, is perfect for us right now. 

Will something more perfect come along? Possible, sure, although the chances are getting exceedingly smaller as our roots grow increasingly deeper in this Seminole-obsessed hamlet.  

And besides: What grocery store hot bar can compete with Publix? 

I guess we’ll settle.