Notes from Top-sider country.

I went into Hartford, the city, today. To say the least, Connecticut is best experienced through the rustic little New England towns and the natural terrain. I think Connecticut "cities" were created just so the many rich people here would no longer have to commute all the 50 minutes to New York City for work. While in Hartford, I must have thought to myself every 5 minutes, "Oh! What is that beautiful historic looking building? Perhaps a museum? Perhaps a former home of a founding father? Oh. An insurance building... Oh! What is that beautiful palatial building? A church? A synagogue? Oh. An insurance building."

This patriotic looking homage to democracy, for example, is the Hartford Fire Insurance Company. Nothing more. Regardless, the countryside here is nice and the towns are storybook quaint. Everyone wears top-siders and ties their sweaters around their shoulders. Naturally, this troubled me as I am never one to fit in.

So, are there really places that are "right" for individual people? I know that in general, there are those who are more "city", "suburb" or "country" types. But isn't it possible to, as the saying goes, "love the one you're with if you can't be with the one you love"? With my work, I like to perpetuate a parallax with art. I find this easier to do in the city. I suppose, however, that it is possible to do anywhere else, as long as I take the time to take in the dynamics of the society.
---Afterall, Shakespeare wrote, as Touchstone, "those that are good manners at the court are as ridiculous in the country as the manners of the country is mockable at court” (not exact words, As You Like It). Contradictions in the world do not cancel each other out, but instead exist side by side as paradox. But ofcourse, I cannot let the general public know this, as it obviates my parallax-driven art. =) So ask yourselves this: Do you like where you are? If not, couldn't you? And if so, why?