"Why, Sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford."
— Samuel Johnson
Just as well I'm not a man, then...
Yep, that's it, I'm all moved out of London and I've not only left the city, I've left the bloody country! I'm now one of those awful EU immigrants. Quick stop in Ireland, six months in Germany and then back to Ireland permanently. And all because I fell in love. Pass the bucket, dear.
I consider myself frightfully British, never more so than when my American friends are bemoaning the price of health insurance and the state of their medical care, and I'm smugly thinking about all the times the NHS has provided me with cheap-as-chips prescriptions, free contraception and, you know, saving my life a couple of times and that... I drink tea like it's going out of fashion. I say 'blimey' a lot. I love Eurovision but can only watch it every year while making smarmy comment s and playing drinking games. I have Welsh, English and Scottish grandparents. I am very proudly British.
But I'd lived in London for 8 years and had grown tired of it, as no man does, according to Mr Johnson. I've spent the past couple of years working on cruise ships for several months at a time, and upon arriving back each time, I realised that I found London oppressive. The clouds felt like a cloak under which there was no escape. I see rush hour less as a rat race than an oversized ant colony, each suited-and-booted ant's dour face reminding me of all that is depressing in the capital. The smells. The tube. The repressed anger. The 24-hour sirens. I'd had enough.
But where to go? Not back on the cruise ships, where I have many happy memories but also where I am stuck oceans away from the people I love, and not back to Devon, where the people I love are a little too close (but seriously, I love you lots). Devon and London are the only places I have ever lived (apart from a couple of years in Milton Keynes, but I was so young that all I remember is the nice roundabout they had outside the Co-op).
This year, my boyfriend and I have had many intermittent Skype conversations about where to live (we both decided living together was needed after only spending six weeks of this year physically together), and as he'd just bought a house, that is our new home. It's in County Cork, which if you've never been here, you should because it's stunning, and the breathtaking scenery combined with the predeliction of its people for walks and a good old chinwag, make it similar to Devon without it being Devon. Perfect.
But we're only here until the New Year because we're both working in Germany for six months! He's going to be building a yacht and I'm going to be nannying. So life feels like it's hit the pause button, which in all honestly I'm not sure is a good thing or not. It means I have six months to plan my post-ship life, but it also gives me six months to poo-poo any idea I have. Hmmm. Maybe I should come up with a set of New Year's resolutions to keep me occupied...
