Dreams 📍
I Hate the Good Life in Delmar
I have never really liked living in Delmar or working in Albany. While it sure it easy to roll out of bed, take a hot shower in my natural-gas heated apartment with electricity that lights a room with a flip of a switch, then take a bus downtown to my good-paying job, it really is a hell of a life that I dislike with a pleasure. I go to work most days in my ugly beige cubicle, write memos, mark up documents, and talk on the phone about business for hours a day, then go home, often holding my head in despair about the day’s events by the time I disembark the bus in front of my apartment.
Its a good life. At least on paper. I got a really nice pickup truck and cap, that I camp in most of the summer, rambling around the various wild forests, state forests, and national forests in the 400 or 500 miles radius of where I live. I get to have many campfires, cook over a fire or on a camp-stove, and get to see many scenic vistas. Compared to many people who struggle to make ends meet, I guess I have a very good life. People who don’t own cars, and can’t afford the increasingly high price for gasoline, don’t get to see the beauty I see.
But still it’s an urban life, that in many ways I dislike.
A special time in my life was going to college at Plattsburgh State. Not particularly because of the college, but because of the small town life. People are laid back in a small town, and vast agricultural landscapes and mountains are never far beyond. People understand what its like to be country. There is a deep connection to the land in a small town like Plattsburgh, something that is missing in a city like Albany, where urban concerns such as pollution, crime, drugs, and violence seem to dominate the headlines.
I’ve resolved to spend at least until Summer 2015, in Albany, if all goes well. Then I tell myself, I am getting out of Albany and New York all together.
If I Leave NY State, Will I Become a Bitter Republican?
The conventional wisdom has it that when people move out of an area for ideological reasons, they become the polar opposite of what they where when they lived in their previous area. People move out to suburbs, from the city, are usually some of the most hard core conservatives, as are those people who move from the rustbelt to the sunbelt.
Maybe.
But if anything, when I was a college student at Plattsburgh, like five years ago, I felt the most active and included in the Upstate and Rural Democrats that dominated that area. The Clinton County Democrats where not dominated by a bunch of liberal extremists out to remake our state in their vision. For the most part, they were just happy to grab whatever little coat tails of power they could grab.
I have never viewed myself as a right-winger, but I do cringe at many of the things liberals advocate for in our state. More regulations and taxes on working folks, just do not seem the right direction for our country. We certainly don’t need any more gun control or people telling us how to live our lives. At the same time, we need a government that stands up for working folks against big corporations.
I feel if I lived in a place where my own political party was not the enemy, then I could be much more involved and active in politics. It’s always more fun being in the minority, and fighting the good fight for the reforms you want to see, against the opposition, rather then being disappointed with your own people for not living up to their own ideals.
Tired
This has been a rough, hard week.
Emotionally draining, devoid of little but work and a much to few hours sleep.
Lots of emotion, taking things personal that I probably shouldn’t.
The only salvation for this week,
is I will be up in the woods in 8 hours.
Then it finally be all over, and just a memory of the week that was.