Family finds respite from rage

We all reach our breaking point: A tax bill. The line at the DMV. The C-SPAN musings of another Beltway blowhard.

Ross Palmer and Sharon Oxley hit theirs the day President George W. Bush was re-elected. Unlike most of us who snap back and accept America with all its flaws — big cars, big people, big egos and small minds — Palmer and Oxley couldn't. They packed up, rented out their Washington, D.C., home and sent an e-mail to family and friends, including me, titled "Why We're Leaving."

"We saw it every morning when we opened the paper," said Palmer, 45.

Vice President Cheney meeting with oil companies. Gun deaths. Enron executives gutting stockholders' life savings.

"It's just disgraceful."

Oxley, 43, grew up the daughter of a steelworker "who got screwed out of his pension."

On Nov. 29, they and their 3-year-old son joined the 6 million Americans living abroad.

The State Department bases that figure on the Americans who have voluntarily registered at foreign embassies, said spokeswoman Nancy Beck. The department doesn't issue exit visas, or interview Americans when they leave, so there's no exact count.

"That's one of the freedoms that we enjoy," Beck said. "Americans can travel and leave the country without us having to approve it."

The couple's reasons for choosing New Zealand read like a to-do list for America. Health care is a basic right. Public schools are adequately funded. Air and water quality are aggressively managed. Church and state are far apart.

"And to those who say, 'Why not stay and rage against the machine?' " Palmer wrote in their goodbyes. "We'd rather live someplace where there's a little less rage."

The e-mail spurred a heated exchange between two friends.

One was a retired Navy commander from Florida who worked for Gov. Jeb Bush:

"My first reaction was, 'Great, leave your U.S. passports at the terminal.' Just too bad you can't take the Baldwin brothers, Barbra Streisand, Tim Robbins and all the other mildly educated mouthpieces in Hollywood with you," he wrote.

Then he softened.

"The simple fact that you and Sharon are smart enough to articulate some of our challenges so eloquently means that you are both wise enough to potentially be part of the solution," he continued. "I look forward to your return."

A friend named Michael shot back at the commander: "So you're proud to be an American. ... Proud of torture and secret prisons. I am ashamed of what the U.S. is doing. ... "

In the end, the two agreed to wish their friends well.

Those wishes are working. Palmer and Oxley have settled in Wellington, where she works for the Ministry of Transport, and Palmer is looking for work.

They spent Christmas beach camping. The wine and beer are great. The produce is especially flavorful, they think, because it's not grown on corporate farms. The Internet keeps them current with family, friends and banking — even the headlines in the dreaded Washington Post.

But Palmer will not be registering with the embassy.

"Unless there's some element of danger," he said the other day, "I don't see the need to tell my government where I am."

"My" government? Isn't he fed up?

"We haven't given up citizenship," he said.

If he hasn't given up — even after moving to the other side of the world — then neither should those of us who are sticking it out.

Nicole Brodeur's column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Reach her at 206-464-2334 or nbrodeur@seattletimes.com.