Monday, July 16, 2007
Did You Miss Me?
OK, I'm back now and already busy brainstorming a redesign. Any thoughts?
I remember once hearing a superstitious theory that there is one place on Earth each person is meant to be and, until you find that place, you will have bad luck.
Well, I've had plenty of bad luck in all the other places I've lived, so I know those places aren't my ideal locations.
But the Kelowna, BC region, my favourite vacation spot, remains a possibility.
All my life I've been cursed with a bad sense of direction. This in spite of the fact that I live in a place that is the archetype of unimaginative 19th century transportation planning. Virtually all the roads, both highways and urban streets, are in nice square grids. How tough can it be to navigate a grid? Very tough, if you're me.
In Kelowna, though, I had a perfect sense of direction. . This was in spite of the fact that the terrain is hilly, the streets are winding and irregular and the towns and neighbourhoods appear thrown together, following no discernable development plan. This is exactly the sort of place that confuses most people. Mrs. Mentok, who usually serves as my navigator (like those birds that perch on the noses of half-blind rhinos), frequently got turned around as we were driving. Yet somehow I always had an accurate sense of where I was and how to get to and from any other location in the area.
So somehow or other, I simply have to end up living out there. If only the mortgages weren't so astronomical!
How about you guys? Have you ever been to a place that just felt so right that you knew it was the place you were meant to be?
posted by Mentok @ 10:07 a.m.,
6 Comments:
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At 1:33 p.m.,
FiL said...
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Yep, Vancouver.
Dearest Mentok, make the move. Stuff the mortgage. Send the kids to work in the mines.
Oh, and welcome back! -
At 5:46 p.m.,
Mentok said...
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Man, you turn into more and more of a Vancouver patriot every day.
You're not far off with the "send the kids to work in the mines" observation. Part of my long-term plan is to cajole and browbeat my kids into lucrative professions (i.e. not small-time magazine editors)so they chip in to buy us one-a dem million-dollar lakeview, vinyard-view house-on-the-hill dealees.
What child would not be grateful to assume a massive debt to please their aging parents? ;-) -
At 8:28 p.m.,
cchang said...
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Maybe sell the kids? Nah, I know you and Mrs. Mentok love them so. :)
I do recall having that distinct feeling before. It was walking around the campus of Cornell (actually where i met my husband. I was there on research grant money..) and on a whim wandered into Uris Hall, a library that sat atop a hill. I looked out the windows in one of the vast study halls and just felt this utter sense of peace and tranquility as I took in the scene outside: the Finger Lakes glistening below a wide sheet of oranges, golds and reds. I had never seen leaves change color in the fall like that before and I just felt so at home even though I'm a southerner. The coffee shops and bookstores all felt familiar to me. Unfortunately this lovely feeling left me once I experienced my first real winter! -
At 3:24 a.m.,
adam said...
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There's a beach in a small English seaside town called Sheringham, on the north Norfolk coast, where I always used to go on holiday as a kid, which has a rock formation you can see when the tide goes out that looks exactly like a hugh tortoise. That beach may well be the place for me. I went to University in that part of the country and one of the main reasons was so I could go there whenever I wanted.
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At 2:21 p.m.,
mkecurler said...
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peekaboo
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At 9:06 p.m.,
Mentok said...
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Cindy - I hear you about the horrors of winter.
Crash - I have a special affection for the seaside, esp. since I so seldom get to see it. Clever you picking a nearby college.
Sabatkes - I see you! Where you been hiding, girl? You know we've all missed you terribly. Drop us a line sometime with your latest news.
