I've been writing (a bit) elsewhere. It's been a weirdly odd couple of days. I realise I am the most miserable being on my own during Thanksgiving break. Maybe it's because it seems more of a "family and friends" thing while Christmas always seemed to me (in the US, at least) as a family-only thing. Therefore, puttering about the house on my own on Thanksgiving is...a bit (ok, a lot) miserable. I also realise that I've been here over two years and don't really think of it as "home". Well, that's normal, I guess. I don't particularly think of anywhere as "home" and, if I had the choice, I'd meet my parents/siblings outside of Nepal (not because Nepal is awful but because the house has memories of my granddad and is also very (very) old and sort of falling apart).
So, yes, Thanksgiving. I want to do all the things I've not had a chance to all semester--revise and send off an article that I've been working on (off and on) for ages. I want to clean the house a bit. Put up some stuff on its walls. Watch a movie (or two). But, after a bit, the whole doing nothing on your own gets to me this week. I suppose it's good then that a couple of friends might be coming down for a visit. But, again, that's stressful since I have to think about cooking and actually cook and try to find things I can cook a day or two ahead so...all right, I'm stressing myself out just by typing that.
I recently had a conversation with someone who had lived here for seven years. She mentioned she hated this place. I don't. I enjoy the birdwatching, the square dancing, the driving around with Dog and having a house with a porch to lounge in. But, I don't see it as a place where I live and that, I think, is the difference. I still think of my friends as the ones in DC (and overseas...but mostly DC). I still try to go to a couple of get-togethers with people each year...also in DC. I still think that, if anything were to happen to me, I'd want to be in hospital...in DC (my doctor's office here has Bible quotes on the walls. Makes me a bit uncomfortable), bludge off my friends...in DC.
Maybe getting a job somewhere further away from DC would have helped me get out of this and forced me to become more social. Maybe not. Most likely not. My view is: I already have friends and there's pretty much no need to make the (stressful and worrying) effort to try to hang out when I don't want to and don't have time. I see the 'burg as a place where I work. I see my work as a place where I work. Not where I live. Not where I'll live all the time. And not as home with friends.
Writing that, I realise I need to change a bit of that. Maybe. But probably not in the next day or two and, on holidays when I do have time to "hang out", I'm never here. So, see? A place to work. Not a place to live. But, for now, that's ok.
So, yes, Thanksgiving. I want to do all the things I've not had a chance to all semester--revise and send off an article that I've been working on (off and on) for ages. I want to clean the house a bit. Put up some stuff on its walls. Watch a movie (or two). But, after a bit, the whole doing nothing on your own gets to me this week. I suppose it's good then that a couple of friends might be coming down for a visit. But, again, that's stressful since I have to think about cooking and actually cook and try to find things I can cook a day or two ahead so...all right, I'm stressing myself out just by typing that.
I recently had a conversation with someone who had lived here for seven years. She mentioned she hated this place. I don't. I enjoy the birdwatching, the square dancing, the driving around with Dog and having a house with a porch to lounge in. But, I don't see it as a place where I live and that, I think, is the difference. I still think of my friends as the ones in DC (and overseas...but mostly DC). I still try to go to a couple of get-togethers with people each year...also in DC. I still think that, if anything were to happen to me, I'd want to be in hospital...in DC (my doctor's office here has Bible quotes on the walls. Makes me a bit uncomfortable), bludge off my friends...in DC.
Maybe getting a job somewhere further away from DC would have helped me get out of this and forced me to become more social. Maybe not. Most likely not. My view is: I already have friends and there's pretty much no need to make the (stressful and worrying) effort to try to hang out when I don't want to and don't have time. I see the 'burg as a place where I work. I see my work as a place where I work. Not where I live. Not where I'll live all the time. And not as home with friends.
Writing that, I realise I need to change a bit of that. Maybe. But probably not in the next day or two and, on holidays when I do have time to "hang out", I'm never here. So, see? A place to work. Not a place to live. But, for now, that's ok.
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