It's official. I have finally settled back into Western living. I no longer hesitate before buying a bottle of water for $3 or paying $20 for a meal. It was obvioulsy futile to resist in the first place since the alternative was to leave and I was enjoying myself so much. So I just had to dig in and spend (spend, spend, spend !!!! moo-ha-ha-ha-ha ), knowing or hoping that work and cold hard cash is not too far away.
My time in San Francisco, which once seemed endless, is now finite and I worry about leaving, about being away from friends, about my new life in England. The prospect of England in Winter and its endless grey skies fills me with dread. I sit in my cosy apartment in San Francisco thinking "... and why do you want to live in England?"
Not only that - it seems almost impossible to replicate the life I have here back in England. The majority of my career TWM (Time with Money) has been spent here in the good old U S of A and when I return I hit the ground running with my apartment, its furniture and my car - all I have left in the UK are a couple of faded Enid Blyton books and an 80's record collection. Can I still get away with wearing my leg warmers? And so in my 40th year when one usually pauses and takes stock of their life, to look at the view from their life's highway, I will be living at home with my parents listening to the Human League. Nice.
 |
 |
But I am excited at the prospect of living in England again. Really, I am. Unfortunately it's an excitement which can only be truly realised when one isn't living in England.
Fifteen years. Fifteen years of visiting. Fifteen years of escaping. Surely novelty will numb the pain for those things not already numbed by cold? Time will tell.
Joking aside, I think it could work. As I alluded earlier, I left England prematurely in my early twenties. At that time I was renting a partially furnished room in a partially furnished house in Bracknell. This time around I am hoping to do significanlty better. Pehaps a fully furnished room in a fully furnished house in London? That would be ideal.
Back here in San Francisco people ask "So, what are you doing?" Good question!!! I can never remember. Nothing it seems but the days seem pretty full and they go by quickly. I wonder how on earth I ever achieved anything when I was working. If I remember correctly that was one of my beefs about full time gainful employment. The cunningly crafted 5 day week with only 2 days of respite, the latter never being quite long enough to make any real changes in lifestyle. No, the only way to really affect change is to jack it all in. Endless days of endless opportunuties. Even now I am still finding it hard to make time for writing, photography and the like but they are receiving much more attention than when I was working.
|