Oregon Trail on Facebook? Who cares, we've been out here the whole time.

[momebie]

The not so unexpected consequence of watching the first episode of Portlandia is that it made me want to move to Portland.

No, that doesn't quite convey what I mean. I've wanted to move to Portland for years. The complication that arose somewhere between Getting To Know Your Free Range Chicken and Locking Steve Buscemi In A Tea Store was that it made me want to ALREADY BE in Portland. Like, yesterday. And the day before. And on and on.

Everyone who commented on the first episode on Hulu mentioned how living in Portland is JUST LIKE THE SHOW. Needless to say I have very high expectations. How do you say that in French? Is it "attente très haute"? No really, I want to know. I'm considering getting a pretentious tattoo to mark the occasion. It's that or a Bright Eyes lyric.

Listen, don't ask me why I want to move there. I can't really tell you. And I'm not just saying that because it's classified information and I'd have to kill you. (I always err on the side of maiming anyway. Blood stains are a bitch to get out, you guys.) I honestly don't know. I've never been to Portland. I've never even driven through Oregon. I have some friends there, but knowing a place doesn't really work via osmosis through the internet yet. I just have this inexplicable tug in my gut and an empty cavity in my chest where home should be. It's right to the left of my heart. If you knock on my ribs you can hear it.

I am fully expecting Portland to fill that hole.

Talk about setting yourself up for disappointment. I am not a proponent of running away from your problems. I know that when I do finally manage to pick my sorry ass up out of my cube and drag it across the country, the main source of my problems will still be there. Namely, me. But sometimes you just need a change of scenery to put everything into perspective, you know?

I'm saying that like my problems are plentiful. They're not really. I have a pretty good life here. I have friends and hipster douchebag farmer's markets and low lit coffee houses and a decent indie record store and a vegetarian tea house. Watching the show this evening actually drove home just how much of what I'm looking forward to having out there I already have right here. A city is just a city. It's a thing. You have to put into it what you want to get out of it. After all, the Orlando I inhabit is not the one you are likely to find if you come here to visit the mouse or the boy wizard.

I expect to put so much into Portland. Right now, getting up in the morning feels like revision. I go to the same places and do the same things. Orlando is my rosary and I click through the beads deftly, without looking. All around me are the vestments of the person I used to be. And as I re-write and edit over the history of that person I can't help but keep an eye on the blank page where I'll start the new chapter. It's so important to me to get this chapter right before I move on, but I've always been enamored with possibility.

Right now I'm head over heels in love with the possibility of what I can make of Portland.

remembering sent me a post card from Portland when she visited the city a while back. On the message part of the card it simply says 'Come home, KL'. I'm working on it.


This [rare non-fiction] entry was written for Topic 11: Haute at therealljidol. All comments and questions are welcome.

Comments

[paragraphs.livejournal.com]

This made me go Awwww though I have a friend who wants to leave Portland just as badly as you want to live there...she is tired of the weather. LOL. But yeah, I am not where I want to be, either. There is a 'feel' to life that I seek and which, to my shock, I felt a jolt of in Nashville of all places. NASHVILLE? But it was there, this feeling of 'I should be here.' My sister and her family are there, so that is part of it, but...I had that feeling in Cardiff too, the second time there, after I got to know the city better. It had that tug.

My home city does give me that every once in awhile, and I do like it here--like right now? The weather we have here makes me LOVE it--but I've lived here all my freakin' life. I want to do different, and am already 48, but now is not the right time.

Nick followed his call to do different, and he is now on his way out of Kiel for the last time, heading for his new life in the UK. He is doing it. You can do it, too. I believe in you, KL! I do.

[momebie.livejournal.com]

You don't know how incredibly lucky I feel to have you out there with your pom poms.

I think it's probably possible for any one person to be at home in lots of places. It's not always evident when a home is a home. It IS evident when a place stops being a home, though, and starts becoming an obligation. (Which isn't to say that I have to force myself to see my friends or do things I enjoy. I'm just. Pedaling backwards sometimes, I feel.)

I'm very excited for Nick, from here on the sidelines. It's interesting watching him go through the move and make his preparations.

[paragraphs.livejournal.com]

He had a mini-crash today, the realization that "okay, when I leave London Sunday, I am going to Plymouth...not back to Germany. Whoa." He goes up and down but that is understandable...he is moving forward though. I know! It is exciting to watch all this unfold (and I admit to being enormously proud of him, and super-chuffed cuz I have a definite feeling of being an important reason why he is able to do this.) It all kinda rocks.

Oh yeah, obligation. I hear you there. I haz them in spades--until my son is established in life, I can't, and won't, and would not dream of moving on from here. So am working hard to make the best of it--seeeeee you advised me a year or so ago to get involved with Nano, and I did, and now I have some awesome friends I see 2-3 times a week. It makes me like this place more, definitely. :)

[momebie.livejournal.com]

The up and down is very understandable. It's really scary, leaving what you know for The Dreaded Future. But it's exciting too. And he's moving for a good reason.

Familial obligations are different, of course. When there are people you love who need you, it helps with the waiting, I think. And I'm still really glad that you found a group you liked. I couldn't imagine not having my writing group, and it always makes me a little sad when I hear about people who can't find one they need. ♥

[xo-kizzy-xo.livejournal.com]

It IS evident when a place stops being a home, though, and starts becoming an obligation.

Absolutely. If I hadn't inherited my house I would have been out of this area ages ago, although, knowing me, I'd probably have some serious bouts of homesickness because, well, this is where I was born and raised...it's home. But now there's nothing keeping me here except myself, and I can't quite untangle myself yet for some reason.

[momebie.livejournal.com]

It's perfectly normal to not be able to untangle yourself. Especially if you're living in a home you inherited in a place where you grew up. We put down deep, deep roots. I couldn't wait to get out of my hometown, because it was small and boring, but that was before I was old enough to really appreciate all of the good things about it. And while I don't want to move back there, my friend was talking to me on the phone last night about all of the little towns in Oregon just outside of Portland that are by the shore and I just felt like I couldn't wait to see them to see how much like my home they were. I think it will be nice to have them there, even though north west shore is surely to be nothing like south east shore.

[xo-kizzy-xo.livejournal.com]

I think part of my untangling has to do with wanting to get a fresh perspective on life but still wanting to hang onto life as I've always known it...I get that it's perfectly normal to feel like that, but at the same time it's incredibly frustrating that I just can't pack up and go.

[momebie.livejournal.com]

Yeah. That's part of my problem. And probably part of why I'm being so slow about it. On one hand, it's very exciting. On the other, it's very terrifying. What about my friends? What about my favorite comic book store? What about my favorite place to buy cake!? What if I don't find those things again? Pfah.