So while getting boxes for the Big Move, the man behind the counter, who introduced himself as Leo to me and as Mr. Incredible to the kids, informed me that he had moved into his first single-family home two years earlier. "New construction," he said.

Normally, I bite my lip when I hear such confessions, thinking- nay KNOWING- that he is doing the escape to the 'burbs where all the savings he mistakenly assumes will occur in his housing costs, come leaking out in added transportation costs. And the added safety benefit of being away from the Urban area will be transferred to the ills that come from a sedentary lifestyle or increased by the greater incidence of being injured in a car accident from greater VMTs (vehicle miles traveled). And the clean air health benefit he supposes he'll find in the 'burbs will be erased and even magnified as a health threat through his daily commute back to the Urban on a crowded freeway where he will ingest nano particles that his lungs cannot expel.

Boy, I am sure smug. But this time my gloating was interrupted. The man before me was African-American and the new construction in some far-flung suburb- I assumed- may be the entrance to affordability to him.

I live a privileged life. I have the luxury of making choices that tilt more toward quality of life and principles than strictly economic factors.