Sojourn II: There Were Always Dreams of Leaving

We're moving out, 2009, Sint Smeding

It's been two weeks since I came back from London and I've had time to reflect on the trip and also where I want to go next. If you want to take that as literally seeking a destination then I guess that would be New York City as one of the earliest films I can remember is Ghostbusters and dozens of other films over the years have impressed parts of the city in my mind (nearly all of which are in Manhattan, so I apologise to the other four boroughs). My thoughts about where to go next are actually life questions. The sojourn down south was one of three desires that arose earlier this year. You could call them goals or aims, but I've never thought of myself as pursuing very clear objectives which is why I've always had a problem answering questions about the extent of my desires - which sounds too passionate but intentions sounds too immediate so I'll roll with the former. The issues raising themselves mark this as a 'quarter life crisis'. I thought I'd gone through a quarter life crisis back when I started flunking college in the early days of the blog though in hindsight it bears more resemblance to angst, still how I went through it did warrant calling it a crisis. On the other hand whilst what I'm describing now is far more contemplative than a mental car crash, it is far more of an actual attempt to find personal direction in my twenty fifth year. Thus, this post is labelled as if it were the second part of the London travelogue.

My desires, for lack of a better thesaurus, seemed to appear out of nowhere. For a long time I've been quite happy to coast along doing things the way I've always done them - taking what comes as if the fog of war has descended on life and you make your attacks only when in visual range. That might be an interesting correlation between my short-sighted vision and behaviour as I often feel like the world only extends a metre at most before it becomes a bright blur that forces me to screw up my eyes in an fruitless effort to see it. The first advance on inertia was in February this year, which is a story in progress to be discussed at a later date. The latter two emerged during May when the rest of the family was away on holiday. This spurred a desire to go on the previously detailed break to London as I figured I'd spent long enough captive in this town like a retina bleached by staring at the same image for too long. It also meant I had the house to myself which I got used to very quickly.

When they returned I was quite irritable. I liked the peace, I liked the quiet, I liked doing the household chores when I felt like doing them, I liked having dinner when I was hungry. I liked my personal space and I've always been a very private person, but here was an instance in which that space was literal. When it was recompacted I realised it wasn't really my space and to regain it and keep it would require a drastic change in circumstances. I may talk about revolution and the changing of order on the global scale, however I personally like the familiar and the predictable when it comes to my own life. I hate emergencies and crises because they echo about in my mind and make it difficult to read all those browser tabs I have open if not outright deny me the opportunity to just sit down after work. However, there's the realisation loitering around the back of my mind that I'm not that far off thirty and if I don't take the off-ramp here there may not be another motorway service station beyond it. There was a time when I was reticent about the idea of such a change in surroundings.

Peeved at the lack of consultation in a refurbishment of the house which would cause several days disruption, I let it be known that I'd been looking at renting a property. This was met with some incredulity under the belief that I'm lazy rather than working to my own rhythm. The fact is, I would do things for myself but they get done by other people before I can. Aside from actually carrying the financial burdens of owning a property, I was doing things for myself whilst everyone else was away. I had my eye on a rented property by the riverside but I wasn't confident about the finances. Whilst I've been waiting for a flat in that same block to become available again I've continued crunching the numbers. I consulted several university websites in similar areas for their estimates on the cost of living and nailed down the council tax band by looking at the purchase prices for apartments in the same building. The bank assures me I could easily get a preferential mortgage with all those wages I never spend built up in my account, yet I'm wary of making such a serious financial commitment at this stage. My estimates are rough as far as I can ascertain and I think on my current pay I could survive without a negative income flow eating into my substantial savings. Nonetheless, if I did have to raid the warchest I could meet four years expenses before it was depleted.

Somewhat inspired by my transatlantic correspondent's transcontinental relocation, I've been entertaining thoughts of moving to London. Aside from work and certain comforts like my local shop, I honestly don't have much invested here. Most of the people I knew in school fled to the bright lights of Glasgow. Since coming back from London I've described this town as a giant walk-in retirement home. The young adults are up in Glasgow, the young families are down in the coastal villages, and the town has been left to the pensioners and the pensioner-mugging junkies. Or at least that's how it feels. I'm by no means the last evacuee though I've harboured a mild resentment that everyone else seems to have deserted the area at the first opportunity. As with seemingly every other statement I've made, age has made me a hypocrite on this too and I understand the appeal of the big city having returned from the capital. I'd rather not be one of those domestic migrants who abandons the provinces for the metropolis and still claims the identity of home, but it certainly has more to offer than here.

I barely ventured more than two miles in London and yet in that small space the urban density provided a wealth of activity and exhibited itself as the juncture of all possibilities. I fear I'm romanticising it as a four-day tourist and on the other hand I'm excited by the place - and not just for all the young women. Indeed, from what I saw it's very much the place of relative youth. Walking along the embankments in the morning is a journey shared with commuters in their twenties and thirties walking, running, cycling, and others being transported in buses and yet others below the ground on the tube almost all with earphones on. As the seat of power it's no coincidence that it looked like a town where things are made to happen rather than a place which has things happen to it. When I stepped off the plane and took my position under the grey skies of home I felt I was missing the action like the show was still going on without me.

For now I'm pursuing the more modest change of moving out by the middle of next year. I've even considered getting my licence and eventually buying a car, though if I lived in London I could use the wonderful integrated transport system... okay, I'll shut up about London.

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