A week off the cyber grid

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you may have noticed that my post was AWOL last week. The reason: I was vacationing in a tiny hamlet in northern Vermont, where for several days we were unable to access the satellite connection for Internet. I reacted badly to the whole thing, and the experience has made me realize I’ve gotten more than slightly addicted to cyberspace. When I couldn’t log on for almost a week, I went through all the usual stages of withdrawal: anger, denial, anxiety, depression, and finally, acceptance. After that, I felt pretty damn good. At least I didn’t have to spend hours per day checking email and social media.

My three weeks on the east coast–during an epic arctic blast–have also confirmed that I am now officially a Californian. Despite this week’s 6.5 earthquake, the state is a pretty glorious place to live. I didn’t always feel this way. I grew up on the east coast, and I remember making fun of California as a youth. When I applied to colleges, I made snide, immature comments about west coast schools such as: Seriously, how could anyone study underneath a palm tree?

But now it’s like my blood has thinned, or perhaps my endurance level has diminished. I love the California sun, the ocean, the sense of space, the lack of serious outerwear. I love the way California men are puzzled by bow ties. During my near-month back east, the only times I’ve willingly ventured outside has been to get to a heated car that already has its door open. I’ve also been complaining a lot. Gad, I must be a real pain in the arse for my relatives to put up with. After all, they’re trapped here.

If your spirit belongs to a region or a place, which place is that? Is it where you live now, or someplace you remember from your youth? Does your writing keep you returning there, again and again?

Or are you a starry-eyed dreamer who knows that someday, someday, you’ll move to your true geographic home?

10 thoughts on “A week off the cyber grid

  1. I fully understand, Kathryn. My wife and I are from the south. We like to look at snow in photographs and on TV,not in person. Fortunately, we already live where everyone else wants to. This last cold blast that reached all the way to Miami convinced us that anything north of Orlando might as well be the Arctic.

  2. tho’ having lived in arizona for 9 years….my heart is firmly rooted in leelanau county in western, northern michigan. it is the most beautiful place on the planet. and yes, it does hold all my lifelong memories. i long for it’s change of seasons, and for the life of me can’t understand someone loving the boring weather of arizona….eternal blue skies and sunshine. i would take 8 blustery days for that one glorious day…because that’s the one in my memory bank….kathy d.

  3. Northern Michigan: That’s a part of the country I’d love to visit, Kathy! I know what you mean about too much sunshine, but dang! It’s cold on the east coast, lol.

  4. ahhhh….but you need to experience the winter season with someone who embraces it….not a huddler/shiverer. see a northern michigan winter sky with no city lights to impede the view…maybe some northern lights to enhance the splendor. cross country ski along the sleeping bear sand dune bluffs…it’s an ansel adams visual in blacks and whites. snowshoe in the woods hearing nothing but the stream flowing through. these experiences always include chili, mulled wine and hopefully a fire. ok, so there’s shoveling off your roof….and your driveway…and insane driving conditions, mud and slush through april etc etc. it’s like the little girl with the curl…when it’s good …. it’s very good ….and when it’s bad, it’s awful. but the good is glorious…and, no i don’t work for the chamber of commerce in michigan…tho’ i could! kathy d.

  5. I grew up in the Pittsburgh area, and I’d move back there in a heartbeat if it wasn’t for my daughter and job being near DC. (Yes, Pittsburgh. Honest to God.)

    I’m probably on the grid as much as anyone I know, between the Internet and watching hockey games on the NHL’s Center Ice package. (Centre Ice for our friends north of the border.) Still, I don’t miss it when I’m away from it for a trip or some other reason. Nice change of pace.

  6. I am Alaskan. All the way through.

    At four years old my parents divorced and my mom remarried a GI from Ohio. While I love my step father, Ohio was not my home, just the place i had to go to school until I could return to Alaska. I returned, found a wife, and planned to stay but ended up in the military for a while and it took another 8 years to get back up here. I’ve been home for nearly 20 years now and don’t plan on living anywhere else for more than vacation time spans.

    The harshness of winter is balanced by the breathtaking beauty of summer. Mountains, wildlife, eagles floating on warm air currents above our heads, moose dining on willow in my back yard. To see the Aurora Borealis when it fills the sky from horizon to horizon with whirling patterns that loop and dance around your head is to see the brush strokes of God as He paints a living dream right before your eyes. There is nothing like it.

    I am Alaskan. I mean, who could possible think under a palm tree?

  7. I’m a nomad but if I delve deeply enough I have to accept that England is my true home – but it’s a fantasy place that really no longer exists (sadly). I have to confess that California is a great second place runner though – the weather is certainly better and I love it here. For my husband however there will never be anywhere else but Australia.

  8. For me, Kathryn, home is Key West. I lived there for nearly twenty years, longer than I’ve ever lived anywhere, and in the same house the whole time. It was my little corner of paradise.

    Unfortunately, in 2005, my aging mother had to move into an assisted living facility from her home in New York State. I was traveling to Las Vegas on a regular basis at the time to play poker, so I moved her into a facility out there (the one in Key West was like something out of a Stephen King novel!).

    Then, following Hurricane Wilma that same year, my wind insurance premiums went through the roof, forcing me out. So I moved to Las Vegas.

    Now my mother has passed away, and I’m thinking about moving back. But even if I don’t, my writing takes me there time and again.

  9. New York New York, but I’d settle for anyplace east of the Hudson and north of DC. I am also an embracer of the cold, and have had enough California sun to last a lifetime.

    Alas, my husband, whom I love (apparently more than I love the Met and the NYPL) is a weather wimp and refers to 40 degrees, which we might have in the middle of the night here, as bone-chilling.

    I admire people whose choices have brought them to live exactly where they want to.

  10. I love Key West, Mike! I always make a pilgrimage to see Hemingway’s double-toed cats, and I love the Victorian homes. Camille, I didn’t realize how much I’ve learned to unembrace the cold until I had to spend all this time in it. Wimp, that’s me!

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