Before Jane points out (rightly so) the bad attitude of the last post and how feeling at home is a choice rather than a pie that drops from the sky, I'm going to re-adjust that attitude myself after having vented.
I had a chance to catch up with my development/activist friends who have returned from similar year-stays/soul-searchings in Latin America, Asia, Africa. The consensus is that it'd take them a lifetime to assimilate into another culture: precondition for enacting change, and there is so much to done in the States. Hence they are going back to their most familiar, childhood communities to make change there. I agree. But I have no such moral sphere of influence. My childhood was spent in a half dozen communities: communist in Beijing, capitalist in Hong Kong, Muslim in Singapore, intellectual in Pennsylvania, WASP in Ohio... I felt no more tied to one than I did another. I have to now seek/make my own community not because that is the most effective way towards change, but because I now want to.
Pico Iyer described himself as "The Nowhere Man": an Indian who lived in America and attended boarding school in England. He savors being an Indian in Cuba, an American in Thailand, an Englishman in New York. I too feel a stronger bond to humanity than I do my countrymen, ethnic group, class because those distinctions aren't so clear for me. I am as pained by Cambodia's suffering as I am by those of middle America.
This may sound like the answer to world peace. But being in the minority, it too makes us disconnected from most of humanity. We become "Seasoned experts at dispassion, we are less good at involvement. We are masters of the aerial perspective, but touching down becomes more difficult. Unable to get stirred by the raising of a flag, we are sometimes unable to see how anyone could be stirred... Being part of no society means one is accountable to no one. If single nation people can be fanatical as terrorists, we can end up ineffectual as peace keepers."
(http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=4639)
That was the Pico in 1997. I heard recently he has found a home in Kyoto. This from a man who 12 years ago considered English to be his only home. (http://happydays.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/the-joy-of-less/?scp=2&sq=pico%20iyer&st=cse)
The me from one year ago is also different. I too want a physical community now, but it'll be a more difficult, limitless, stressful, and exciting search than most.
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I enjoyed this post. Since I like disagreeing with you:), I will point out that the journey for community is difficult, stressful, and exciting for all. Even people who have a more constant cultural and physical upbringing have to figure out what aspects of their society they want to take on and whether they are comfortable there. Being a minority in any respect, be it race, sexuality, ideology, makes you feel distant from where you were raised.
ReplyDeleteI will attest that as a heterosexual, white middle/upper class female, it's easy enough for me to fit in where I come from. Although my thoughts may differ from the mainstream from time to time, I know how to cope socially with that and get along with many average people, probably because my various categorical identities are average.
I moved to the Pacific Northwest because I thought this might be the place for me. Everyone loves the environment, there are bike lanes, the "wilderness" is close by, the food co-op is humongous, people are put off by globalization, there's medical marijuana, and most people are well-educated. Living here is great in a lot of respects, but it's also predictable to a certain extent. There's definitely not as much diversity as there was in Columbus; hence, there are less awesome cultural events (e.g. jazz shows, gallery hop, out of town musicians, wonderful food and many bars, and distinct neighborhoods). But at the same time, I'm living in a place that represents many of my ideals. When I move, I will always miss aspects of this community. You take a little bit from each place you go and hopefully you take away the good parts.
Oh Jane, we both know you only relish disagreeing with me because these instances are so rare compared to all the times you agree with me:D.
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