the town mouse and the country mouse..

was one of my favourite books when i was little. but it distressed me quite alot. and this is because i am easily swayed, and because i can understand both the terror of being a country mouse in a big town, and the vast emptiness and all its associated fear, for a town mouse who finds himself in the country.
lately i feel i have certain dilemmas on my hands, about do i stay in manchester, or do i head back for the west country, to london, to ireland even....
i am no further along the road to having an answer, but the questions pose yet more questions about what sort of a mouse i am....
when i think of jon and ellie, tucked away in their walesville setting, far from the localised horrors of moss side, no more tossed about by this fickle city of ours....i am filled with this glad envy....and when i am here, in my parents' pink house, it is not the country, but the country is a mere stone's throw, and you can feel it...and there is a larder and space and seagulls...and then there is the far west country, land of my birth and the home of the freshest air these shores can offer...but part of me, even now after a year of it being part of my day, is still slightly enchanted by the grim creativity and secretive depth of the northern quarter....and rusholme high street never tires for me....and the walk up arrow-straight wilbraham road to trof is well-trodden and is perfect for a good music-while-walking time....
and so you see i am divided....geography getting the better of me once more. there is a part of me that would like nothing more than the jam-making, egg-collecting and fete-planning of the country life of a farmer's wife....
and yet i walk up oldham street, as as per previous posts, navigate my way through the pawn and porn shops, witch supplies shops and rehashed retro clothing shops and dirty, dirty pubs full of either casually dirty young creative types, or determinedly dirty old men, and i find a bizarre peace...i think it comes from knowing that all would continue such if i were not there, for it is as has has been since lowry and before...
but then the farm wouldn't be going anywhere either, would it..
no-where needs me, you see, and its liberating and terrifying at the same time...
my head is spinning a bit these days from decision-making and let-downs and lovely camping and no more harry and no more west wing and work being mental and just not really feeling at all ready...
so i'm going to take a stroll into gloucester...and see what happens...i can promise you coffee will be involved...and hopefully the buying of a new book...and then blues music and sitting outside and angela's hen-do and honey beer and getting drunk and laughing alot and then coming home and probably resuming thinking again...
ugh...
its good though, isn't it..? its hard to get on in life if you don't know what kind of a mouse you are...