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My answer to my travel/home question
Since I asked, and did not answer, the question about traveling and home in my previous post, now I attempt to answer.
Travel is something that I most frequently do to visit people, but the thing about that is that it's difficult to come up with suggestions of what to do while there if that's the only reason I'm there. So part of the point of the question was to get some idea of what there _is_ to do in various locations.
I also travel because I love love _love_ to see new places (even if I hate with a passion actually _getting_ places - I can't move around enough on planes, and don't usually have enough time when driving that I don't have to drive far more than I like and/or stay in the car far longer than I like. My driving tolerance is lower than my car tolerance, and I really _don't_ like driving. At least I no longer _hate_ it, I suppose. I kinda like cruises, though, if I'm with people whose company I enjoy. I say, having only been on one. ;).
I like to see the variety in the surrounding countryside, to get a sense of how things in a new place are different as well as to get a flavor for the similarities, to go both to especially striking outdoor locations (never been to the grand canyon, for example, and want to. Never been to a desert, unless you count Spain 10 years ago...) and to indoor things which might be only available in a specific location. I like to try to get a flavor for the food available in different locations (at least as best I can, considering my strong dislike for picante and/or fatty foods). I like accent differences, different rhythms of speech, and different phrasings. I like to find similarities among people, as well as places. I like to get a sense if a place is somewhere I could ever live (if not, it's less likely I'll be back, because it means I was _really_ not comfortable there). I _really_ like traveling. But I'm also really good at getting lost, and don't have the greatest methods of coping with that (although I'm better). So traveling alone is _always_ scary, even though I still do it. And I do it far more than I used to.
Home. I don't know if I really know what I'm looking for in a locality as far as home. Home for me is usually the people, not the place, but there are some place specific things I like, too. The Boston area is the closest I've come so far, because where I live right now is far enough away from the city that I'm not drowing in excessive numbers of people, I can find reasonably quiet natural surroundings to go to, and it's not _that_ far from places where I can be even more remote if I want. And, where I am is not that far from Boston proper (~45 minutes), is on public transport (even if I don't use it, others can use it to get to me), and is a reasonably distance from a job I largely enjoy (although it's not something I feel especially pulled to do). I like being close to Boston because I really, really, really like the social groups I am finally starting to feel a part of (I never feel fully a part of any groups, mind you) - poly boston & suspects, mainly. But those two have a _lot_ of diveristy in terms of what goes on, and it is good. I'm close to places where I can feed the part of me interested in energy work and similar, as well.
The _problem_ with here, a major problem, and probably the reason I will not stay here forever, is the wintertime. I simply do not get enough sunlight in the winter, and this is a dramatically bad thing for me, emotionally, for my sanity.
I have not stayed long enough in/been to enough other places to know where else I would like to live. I am unlikely to want to move further north, as I grew up in a place not that different from other locations in northern New England, and that was... boring and not somewhere I ever even got close to fitting in. Spain was... more even that it being really really dry where I was, I felt stifled there. I enjoyed it, but I could not completely be myself. I have not lived anywhere else. And I did not get enough of a sense of Northern California during my weekend there to have any idea.
Travel is something that I most frequently do to visit people, but the thing about that is that it's difficult to come up with suggestions of what to do while there if that's the only reason I'm there. So part of the point of the question was to get some idea of what there _is_ to do in various locations.
I also travel because I love love _love_ to see new places (even if I hate with a passion actually _getting_ places - I can't move around enough on planes, and don't usually have enough time when driving that I don't have to drive far more than I like and/or stay in the car far longer than I like. My driving tolerance is lower than my car tolerance, and I really _don't_ like driving. At least I no longer _hate_ it, I suppose. I kinda like cruises, though, if I'm with people whose company I enjoy. I say, having only been on one. ;).
I like to see the variety in the surrounding countryside, to get a sense of how things in a new place are different as well as to get a flavor for the similarities, to go both to especially striking outdoor locations (never been to the grand canyon, for example, and want to. Never been to a desert, unless you count Spain 10 years ago...) and to indoor things which might be only available in a specific location. I like to try to get a flavor for the food available in different locations (at least as best I can, considering my strong dislike for picante and/or fatty foods). I like accent differences, different rhythms of speech, and different phrasings. I like to find similarities among people, as well as places. I like to get a sense if a place is somewhere I could ever live (if not, it's less likely I'll be back, because it means I was _really_ not comfortable there). I _really_ like traveling. But I'm also really good at getting lost, and don't have the greatest methods of coping with that (although I'm better). So traveling alone is _always_ scary, even though I still do it. And I do it far more than I used to.
Home. I don't know if I really know what I'm looking for in a locality as far as home. Home for me is usually the people, not the place, but there are some place specific things I like, too. The Boston area is the closest I've come so far, because where I live right now is far enough away from the city that I'm not drowing in excessive numbers of people, I can find reasonably quiet natural surroundings to go to, and it's not _that_ far from places where I can be even more remote if I want. And, where I am is not that far from Boston proper (~45 minutes), is on public transport (even if I don't use it, others can use it to get to me), and is a reasonably distance from a job I largely enjoy (although it's not something I feel especially pulled to do). I like being close to Boston because I really, really, really like the social groups I am finally starting to feel a part of (I never feel fully a part of any groups, mind you) - poly boston & suspects, mainly. But those two have a _lot_ of diveristy in terms of what goes on, and it is good. I'm close to places where I can feed the part of me interested in energy work and similar, as well.
The _problem_ with here, a major problem, and probably the reason I will not stay here forever, is the wintertime. I simply do not get enough sunlight in the winter, and this is a dramatically bad thing for me, emotionally, for my sanity.
I have not stayed long enough in/been to enough other places to know where else I would like to live. I am unlikely to want to move further north, as I grew up in a place not that different from other locations in northern New England, and that was... boring and not somewhere I ever even got close to fitting in. Spain was... more even that it being really really dry where I was, I felt stifled there. I enjoyed it, but I could not completely be myself. I have not lived anywhere else. And I did not get enough of a sense of Northern California during my weekend there to have any idea.
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*nods emphatically* That's exactly the conundrum I have with "travelling". I like being in new places. A lot. A whole lot. I don't like getting there. At all.
Despite the impatience and lack of moving space (and a touch of travelsickness when I was younger), I've had some good conversations and peopletime during the ucky gettingthere part of travelling though... it can also provide time for necessary introspection.
I think it would help a lot if the paper book I'm reading could be instantaneously changed to an audiobook, especially for car trips.
(I never feel fully a part of any groups, mind you)
*nodsigh*
I simply do not get enough sunlight in the winter, and this is a dramatically bad thing for me, emotionally, for my sanity.
Sunlamps?
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Yes.
Note that I don't so much _mind_ not feeling a part of groups - I _do_ feel kinship with small numbers of _people_, but they tend to be scattered too much to be a group.
And... I use sunlamps. And broad spectrum light bulbs. This is why I survive winters at _all_ reasonably.
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Hmm... Groupses *thinkmuseponder* Perhaps I will post more of my thoughts on this subject. Depends on how lazy/busy/bored I am...
Time to raise the stakes then! Go Get High-powered Vampire Burning UV Sunlamps! (Oh, wait those are called "tanning beds". And are bad for you.) Hmm... Greenhouse? Just for you? ^_^
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Groupses *thinkmuseponder* Perhaps I will post more of my thoughts on this subject. Depends on how lazy/busy/bored I am...
Do! I have curiosity! (Of course, I _usually_ have curiosity)
those are called "tanning beds"
I've tried that, actually. It's worse than having sunlamps because I tend to forget to go. And yes, with the bad for one's skin.
Greenhouse might be fun, although I'm not sure it'd _help_, because it's the same amount of sunlight. :)
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Tanning beds scare me, due to the potential skin cancer part. Then again, I don't really care what particular tone my skin is... White, dark, whatever.
Yes to the forgetting to go do [random errand].
Hmm... it focuses the light though. Really, it only raises the temperature, which I was connecting with summer.
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Really, it only raises the temperature, which I was connecting with summer.
Yes. But heat is not the problem. Right kind of light is.