Judy Asher puts the problem more succinctly: "So far, we haven't been able to give up anything."

"The other night," says Martin, "I walked out of the house in Westport, and it was warm but so foggy you could hardly see. I found myself thinking, 'This is really beautiful.' But then I thought, 'If the same thing happened in January, and I'd just gotten off the train at the end of a long commute, would I still find the poetry in it?' "

The answer of course, is that moving to the suburbs is a trade-off. Jody Gaylin, 33, moved two years ago from the Upper East Side to Hastings before the birth of her third child. Her husband, a network news producer, commutes.

"For me, the city is more fun, more exciting, less isolating," says Jody, a freelance writer who thinks of herself foremost as a mother. "But finally, I just had to face facts. I was getting awfully tired of sitting on benches in playgrounds, supervising kids who didn't need my supervision, and paying ridiculous amounts of money so my children could be taken on a bus to baseball fields many miles away."

Jody thinks the sacrifices have been worth it. "I was dragged from the city kicking and screaming," she says, "but now I couldn't be happier. It's fantastic to be here with kids."

Not everyone feels such equanimity. Like the Ashers, Richard Simon*, 37, and his wife, Patricia, 35, bought the first house they looked at in Westchester. But then they got cold feet and tried to sublet the house while they reconsidered leaving the cramped New York apartment they shared with their five-year-old and their newborn. There were no takers on the house, however, and they could not carry the costs of two homes. In December, they sublet the New York apartment and moved to Westchester.

Cutting back on the job can sink a promising career.

"Maybe it's that I just don't have enough inner repose to be out here gardening and enjoying nature," says Patricia. "I want action and excitement, and this place just doesn't have it. I'm not even convinced it's such a great place to raise kids. I went to visit the public school, which is supposed to be good, and the kids were all lying on the floor giving each other noogies. Then the teacher started reading a letter to the class from their pen pal in Argentina. It began, 'We are ruled by generals.' The teacher never even mentioned that there's been a changeover to a democracy in Argentina." Most parents probably don't worry about such political distinctions when it comes to five-year-olds. Patricia did.

"I was horrified," she says. "That alone was enough to turn me off to the school." The Simons would be happiest if they could send their daughter to Brearley, but they've decided commuting to Manhattan is simply too far. Instead, they've compromised on a private school in Riverdale.

By contrast, there are a growing number of New York parents who are having second thoughts about sending their children to private schools. The cost—$6,000 a year and up—is one factor, but so is the fierce competition for admission, in which even four- and five-year-olds are subjected to tests and interviews.

"We refused to put our daughter through it," says Robert Murray, who will be sending his daughter to a public school upstate this fall. "It just seemed like inordinate stress, and I wasn't comfortable with the whole atmosphere of elitism."

Elaine Cohen, 39, who last month moved from Manhattan to Katonah with her husband and two-year-old son, feels enormous relief that she now needn't face the private-school process. "I began to worry that I'd turn into something I didn't want to, that I'd start to feel competitive for my child to get into one of three or four schools, and that I wouldn't like myself for it," she says. "I didn't want to feel the pressure. And I didn't want my son to feel the pressure. There's plenty of time for that. The key to success and happiness is not necessarily going to Dalton."

Audrey and Lee Manners learned that lesson painfully. After their five-year-old daughter tested well last fall, they made applications to four top private schools. All four put her on their waiting lists. That solved the Mannerses' ambivalence about the suburbs: In the fall, they will move from their Upper West Side co-op to their new home in Ridgewood, New Jersey.

Martin and Judy Asher went through the private-school application process once for their son, but decided once was enough. This spring, looking for alternatives, they visited P.S. 87, a public school on 78th Street near Amsterdam Avenue. For several years, the school's principal, Naomi Hill, has successfully recruited the children of parents who might not otherwise have considered public school. The Ashers—who fit Hill's profile—were impressed both by the mix of the student body and the unexpected richness of the school's resources. They have enrolled their four-year-old for the fall.

Related:

• Archive: “Features”
• Articles by Tony Schwartz
• From the Jul 15, 1985 issue of New York