peripathetic

And now I'm back in Bath. And probably I'm not going to be here for too much longer, either. Back to the grind of northern ireland and politics and lack of sun and lack of London. It's going to be strange. Previously, when I lived in London and travelled to Bath for the weekend, or travelled home for the holidays, I felt firmly anchored in London even though I was away from it. I knew that it would always be where I came back to. I knew I belonged.

But this time has been different. Not in terms of how I feel about all the nice places and people I know and love. But the whole place has felt more exciting, more brutal (that's understandable because I've been away from it) but more... liveable in. And at the same time, less appealing to live in. By which I mean that I feel stronger for my time spent living back in Belfast. And that, because I feel stronger and calmer, London doesn't draw me with the irresistible tug which it could deploy the year before last. I love the place, dammit. I want to go back there right now, and stay with Jonathan for another few nights, and see the places, and see the eyes looking into mine and passing me by, looking into mine and keeping on gazing.

But although I'd love to live there again... I don't need it as badly as I once did. It's shallow, and strange for me I think, but the one thing I most miss about the place itself, discounting the people I know for a moment, is the sexual freedom. I don't mean taking a boy into a bush and shagging him senseless, but just the freedom there is in who you can look at, in what way. Belfast doesn't have that. I'll miss it anew. I like looking at well-turned bodies. But well-turned bodies (from what I know anyway) usually conceal shallow bastards. And that's one particular personality-type I can do without, and which Belfast doesn't really have too many of in the way London does.

Yes, us northern irish people are nice, we are. :o)