a town that sleeps

I’m a daydreamer. I guess we all are, but I spend what is possibly more than my share of time dreaming of things I could do, places I could go.

Most recently I’ve gotten back into imagining myself in a big city. I glamorize every aspect of it. The rush to cross busy streets before a car comes. Carrying a paper cup of coffee with an occasional drop splashing out onto my wrist as I hurry down the sidewalk. The crowds, thousands of people heading in the same direction, all too busy to stop and say hello. It seems magical, in some weird way.

But I’m not a city girl. I’m, at most, a suburb girl… And really probably meant for the rural life. I forget these things sometimes and distract myself with the hurrying dreams.

I ignore the fact that what I really want is slow and easy. I forget that hurried means a lot more than just moving quickly. It’s not having time to even say ‘hello’ to strangers, for christ’s sake. It’s coffee spilling onto the cuff of my brand new, neatly pressed shirt. It’s dirty streets and questionable smells.

I don’t mean to knock these places. I love them. I love to visit them, really. Some people feel very passionate about the quirks of a big city. Some people feel at home in the race, but it’s not me.

So I sit happily in my little apartment not too far from a mid-size (small?) city that I now call home, and I realize that’s the maximum amount of rush I really need. I’d like to be able to walk or bike to work. I’d like to have reliable public transportation to anywhere within the same zip code, but I don’t have that.

We all trade some things in life, and settle for others.

I’ve always liked the allure of a trip to the big city, the shopping, the beautiful people dressed like they just stepped out of a magazine, the flurry of activity.

But I love a town that goes to sleep at night, a town  where local musicians play the same spots over and over again, a town that lets me be a recognizable regular at my favorite bagel shop.

I love a town where I can wave to any stranger on the street and returning the favor wouldn’t slow her down or make her late to wherever she is headed.