An English Odyssey

What to do when one is a bit bored? Answer: make things happen. As I mentioned before, one lives through the boring times looking to the more exciting things. I am blogging right now because something will happen soon that I have been expecting and longing for since 2007: we are going to be around Liverpool and Manchester next weekend. I have been missing Liverpool for quite a while, so it will be good to see it again. And I also It also means that we will celebrate Valentine's Day up North. As I am not a Scouser, I only lived there a year and I will not live there again, Liverpool is not exactly my Ithaca (not to mention that Ulysse did not have his wife following him on his long trip abroad and back), but it is my favourite city after Montreal. It is maybe the only foreign city with Dublin where I did not feel like a foreigner.

I love travelling by train for long journeys, even though it can be exhausting. I love the atmosphere of train stations, reading in the train is part of life's pleasures and I just find the constant movement of the train strangely soothing. So I am looking forward to the journey itself.

Travelling into known territories is different from travelling into the unknown. Going to a familiar place makes you less anxious, but you can end up disappointed, since the place has changed and it can clash with the vision you had of it. Whatever the state of mind, the return, because it is a return (however brief), is going to be an emotional one. The departure is also difficult. I will renew for the weekend with the little things that were parts of my life then: soirée with friends, generous drinking (not too much though as I get older), some gin and tonic (specialty of my former housemate), local ales, etc. Things have changed, but not so much.

And I hope people found out all the references I made to The Odyssey in this entry.