There is little to do and the streets are devoid of life. But people live contentedly here, more affluent than their counterparts in the seventies. So if it was so familiar, why did it feel so strange?
My feelings were contradictory and confused because of the dissonance between, on the one hand, recognizing completely the kind of place where I was and, on the other, sensing that I ceased to belong here years ago. My discomfort embarrassed me. To find unusual that which was completely normal said a lot about how far removed from the typical life of my compatriots and upbringing I had become. But, of course, I was not alone. This world is rarely written about, because people in the national media and the arts don't live here and don't come here, even if they come from here. For them "getting real" means the extreme poverty of the inner cities. The mundanity of the typical life passes them by.
Julian Baggini, Welcome to Everytown: A Journey into the English Mind.
Comments