New Places, Same Power
Moving, changing, shifting — without losing yourself in the process.
As I navigate around the city that I now call home, I can't help but marvel at how life has unfolded. At 61, I've called many places home throughout my life. I’ve unpacked and packed more times that I can count. Storage facilities are an old friend. Nevertheless, each move has taught me something profound about resilience, identity, and the peculiar power that comes with starting fresh — again and again.
My journey reads like a geography lesson in personal reinvention: Walsall to London for university, back to Walsall for family responsibilities, Walsall to Bedford for marriage, back to Walsall after divorce, Bedford again for independence, Bristol for adventure, and now London again to bond with my adult children. Four different places, multiple transitions, and through it all, something remarkable happened — I didn't lose myself in the process. I found myself more completely each time.
That Uber driver who commented on my "rich person's laugh" a few months ago picked up on something I'm only now understanding fully. He heard the sound of someone who's genuinely comfortable in her own skin, regardless of the postcode. But it took decades of geographic and spiritual wandering to develop that unshakeable sense of self.
The Ripple Effect of Coming Home (And Leaving Again)
My pattern of returning to familiar places isn't unusual. Research shows that many people, particularly young adults, experience what is called the “boomerang effect” — moving back to places that once felt like home as they navigate major life transitions. After my 25-year marriage ended, returning to Walsall to stay with my mother wasn't retreat; it was strategic regrouping.
There's something profound about being back in your childhood geography during a major life upheaval. The streets remember who you were before you became who everyone expected you to be. That return to Walsall reminded me of my pre-marriage self — the woman with dreams and opinions and a fervent desire for unadulterated freedom.
But here's what I learned: you can go home again, but you can't stay home again. Not when you've grown beyond the borders of your original geography. Moving back to Bedford wasn't about nostalgia; it was about applying everything I'd learned about myself in one place to build something new in another.
The Bristol Gamble: When Comfort Zones Become Cages
The move to Bristol was different. It wasn't about necessity or convenience — it was about curiosity. At 57, I packed up my life to move somewhere I'd never been, driven by something my children suggested and my instincts affirmed. That takes a particular kind of confidence that you can only develop after you've already proven to yourself that you can survive anywhere.
Bristol taught me something crucial about geographic mobility after 50: the place doesn't change you — it reveals you. The confidence I found there, the skills I built, the version of myself I discovered — none of that was gifted by the city. It was all already inside me, waiting for the right environment to emerge.
London Calling: Redefining Family Geography
The move to London has been the most surprising of all. My adult children, established in their own careers and lives, invited me to be part of their world not as the mother who raised them, but as the woman they've watched become. There's something profoundly moving about your children seeing you as a full person worthy of friendship and adventure.
"Sixty in the City" — my social media series documenting my London life — started as a way to show that our stories don't end at 50, or 55, or 60. They evolve. The woman exploring London galleries and trying new restaurants and making sense of this big, bold and bright city isn't trying to be younger. She's being fully herself at 61, in a city that rewards curiosity and energy regardless of the age bringing it.
The Science of Reinvention Geography
What fascinates me about my own pattern is how it aligns with emerging research on neuroplasticity and environmental change. Our brains remain remarkably adaptable throughout our lives, but they need novelty to stay sharp. Each geographic move has literally rewired my brain, forcing new neural pathways and keeping me cognitively agile.
Literature suggests much of the decline in geographic mobility may be a response to the changing needs of both households and firms, but for women over 50, strategic geographic moves can be both life and career accelerators. New networks, fresh perspectives, different industry concentrations — each move has expanded my professional and personal possibilities.
The Three Powers of Geographic Reinvention
Through my multiple moves, I've identified three distinct advantages that geographic transitions offer women over 50:
Strategic Anonymity: Nobody in Bristol knew my history, my previous roles, or the version of myself I'd outgrown. This clean slate allowed me to introduce myself based on who I was becoming, not who I'd been. Strategic anonymity is a powerful tool for career transition and personal growth that's uniquely available to those willing to change geography.
Network Multiplication: Each move doesn’t replace your existing network — it multiplies it. Your connections, relationships, communities and friendships can all co-exist together and create a web of opportunities and perspectives that would be impossible to achieve while staying in one place. Geographic diversity creates network diversity, which creates opportunity diversity.
Identity Flexibility: Perhaps most importantly, each move has proven to me that I can be fully myself anywhere. The woman who thrived in small-town Bedford is the same woman exploring metropolitan London, but she's expressed differently based on the environment. This kind of identity flexibility is liberating in ways I couldn't have imagined when I was younger and more geographically fixed.
Redefining Home After 50
At 61, living in my fourth different city as an adult, I've come to understand that home isn't a place — it's a practice. It's the daily choice to show up authentically wherever you are, to build community intentionally, and to remain open to the possibilities each new environment offers.
My current London chapter, documented through "Sixty in the City," represents something I couldn't have imagined when I first moved to Bedford as a young bride: the possibility of choosing where to live based purely on joy and connection rather than obligation or necessity.
Living with my adult children isn't about dependence — it's about interdependence. We're building memories as equals, exploring the city as companions, creating new family traditions based on mutual respect and shared adventure. It's a kind of geography I never knew was possible: the geography of chosen family and intentional proximity.
Looking Forward: The Next Move
Will London be my final geographic chapter? Honestly, I don't know. And for the first time in my life, that uncertainty feels like possibility rather than anxiety. I've proven to myself that I can thrive anywhere, build community everywhere, and remain authentically myself regardless of the postcode.
What I do know is this: each move has made me more confident, not less. More rooted in myself, not more displaced. More certain of my values and abilities, not more confused about my identity. The power I've found isn't in any particular place — it's in the proven ability to take myself successfully anywhere.
For women over 50 considering a geographic move — whether driven by career opportunity, family circumstances, or simple curiosity — remember this: you're not starting over. You're taking everything you've learned and applying it somewhere new. You're not losing your history; you're adding to it.
The Geography of Power
The Uber driver who noticed my "rich person's laugh" was right, though not in the way he imagined. I do sound wealthy — wealthy in experience, in confidence, in the kind of deep contentment that comes from knowing you can bloom wherever you're planted.
Three new places, same power. Four decades of moves, and I've never lost myself in the process. Instead, I've found more of myself each time. The geography changes, but the woman navigating it becomes more authentically herself with each transition.
That's the real power of geographic mobility after 50: not the ability to escape who you are, but the freedom to become who you've always been, unencumbered by other people's expectations or your own limiting beliefs about what's possible.
The world is wide, full of cities that haven't met you yet and communities that need exactly what you have to offer. The question isn't whether you're too old to move — it's whether you're ready to discover what becomes possible when you do.