Not only the children don't get to see you, but neither your partner. American nightmare, I'd say. Relationships break, and all the grass in the world will not make up for it.

And kids are smart and pick up on things fast—a kid who sees their parent suffering through a grueling commute every day is going to absorb that as some kind of life lesson.

I've heard too many people justify a horrible commute and shitty job with "my dad did it, it put me in school and food on the table". If you don't absolutely have to, don't. It isn't a right of passage

Or, "She loves me". No, she treats you the way your mom treated your dad right up until the divorce.

I moved to a lake house with a forest, like many Scandinavians people do when they can afford it, and it's been absolutely worth the extra commute.

The trick is to spend your time smart, which means I watch a lot less Netflix than I did before I added 30 minutes to my commute.

I'm not an extreme commuter by American standards though, I only do 2-2 and a half hour a day in total. We also work 37 hour weeks, so there is that.

I wouldn't trade actual quit and spectacular nature for anything in the world though.

It's not just a yard. This is declining now, but for example, for decades children's blood lead levels were correlated to their proximity to the inner city.