Requiem for a non-dream

What is it to leave a place?

In the last decade of my life, I have lived in a half-dozen cities. In the first five I lived in, I cried upon leaving. In the Windstar driving down Cymbal Lane away from Julie en route to Philadelphia. Watching Brian roll around in agony in his bed on the first floor of Butcher our senior year. At LAX hugging my mom before boarding my flight to Tokyo. In my apartment across the street from Tohoku University after my friends took me out for one last drink. Alone on a plane at Narita reading Kaori's letter to me. In an empty apartment 2304, holding Jen and rifling through all of our memories together after we had thrown out the last of my belongings before I flew back to London for good in March 2009.

Why won't I cry when I leave London? Is it because I wasn't here long enough to develop the devastating emotional connection I had with other towns? But I lived here longer than Sendai and Tokyo. Is it because I was doing long distance and don't have the emotional memories I had in Chicago? But I scrambled aggressively to build my own life here. Is it because there is no finality about my leaving? But I have all but decided in my mind that I will leave. Then is it because I never felt a connection to London from the first day I lived here?

Perhaps.

London is the first city I've lived in which never felt natural to me. In which I was truly polarized about being here. My frustrations are myriad and well-voiced. Even when I arrived and loved every inch of everything I laid eyes on, I knew if I were to stay here longer than a few years, I'd be disappointed. Twenty months has been too short, but I thirty-seven months would have been too long.

It's strange to not feel more upset about what is transpiring; after all, more than anywhere else I've lived, this town is leaving me with feelings of what if; what would my friendships have developed into if I had stayed? What would have become of me professionally? What effect would that have on my family?

Would moving to New York after Africa and not coming back here or testing the waters in Asia amount to a cop out? I don't know the answer to that either, but I'm going to try to find out.