Home thoughts from abroad

I am coming to the conclusion that I am essentially quite homesick. Even though I have been here for just over six months, there are so many things that I miss about Birmingham.

As a guess, these thoughts have been triggered by finally changing my address on all sorts of “official” things, like bank accounts, heralding the idea that I have irrevocably left.

Granted, where I am now is by now means repugnant, but it is in comparison pretty parochial. The size of the place does have some advantages; few places in the city are much more than a 15-minute drive away and it has been very welcome to be not more than a short bus ride away from work – a huge difference to the commute I was doing until January.

There are a number of things that I am pining for. I miss is the vastness, the urban sprawl. I had pretty much always lived on or near the edges of the city, so I never felt enclosed by the confines of the inner city and was never more than a few minutes’ drive away from countryside. The best of both worlds, I suppose.

I also miss my friends, even the ones that I maybe only saw once every few weeks. I’m very aware of proximity; I know they’re further away than they used to be, even when they are a phone call or a messageboard away.

It’s still strange to not hear local voices around me every day. I know that for most people, the Brummie accent is one of the most unalluring in the world, but I miss the musicality and the self-deprecating humour of those that bear it. Yesterday I was accused of starting to sound “posh” through hearing other voices all the time. Posh? Perish the thought.

I’m finding it hard to break into new social circles. The people I work with don’t socialise with each other at all other than going out for a meal when somebody leaves. In any case, I haven’t really met anyone at the hospital that I would like to share my social time with. Not that I’m overly picky about my friends, but I have always gravitated towards people who are slightly bohemian or unconventional and so far, there is something of a dearth of them.

There are a number of musicians that I know here, but they seem happy in their own social groups without any new additions to it. So this would appear to be a circle that is firmly closed.

The “other” social circle is the one that, while happy to acknowledge who I am on a peripheral level, seems to have politely swept me under the carpet for anything other than small talk, for fear of condoning the relationship that I am in.

This will not change, not for the foreseeable future and this is more painful than I ever dreamed it would be. I have always accepted people entirely for what they are, not out of adherence to conventions, moral or otherwise. While I can understand the thinking behind it, the thought that one day a piece of paper will magically change their attitude towards me is quite laughable.

I will still be the same person.

But acceptance could be a long way off; I don’t anticipate my status changing for a long time, if ever, as there are all sorts of things could conspire against it, all manners of delays and awkwardnesses that could make it impossible.

Funny, it never mattered particularly to me before, but now it gnaws at me. Maybe it’s a measure of how much you matter, as for the last ten years it has been absolutely the last thing on my mind – indeed, something that I even actively resisted.

In the end, this is all a measure of how much you matter, as without you, my life would be entirely different.

It’s even possible that I would be alone by now, living on the boat, as I don’t think I could have sustained being where I was. I would have possibly been living on Sherborne Wharf, right in the heart of Birmingham and not much more than a stone’s throw from where I used to work. I would have had freedom, convenience, space (albeit limited space on a forty foot boat) and a lot of disposable income, as life afloat is nothing if not economical.

But I would have not have had you.

There is no earthly way that I would be here for any other reason. If the homesickness will not pass, there will somehow be a way of putting up with it. Like the pain of an old injury, it never truly goes away, but you come to ignore it.