Valya’s Blog

It’s a muggy Portland evening. I love it! It reminds me of my home city, Varna, where the summertime is so hot and humid that you can sit outside at a cafe downtown at midnight in nothing but jeans and a T-shirt and be sweating.

There are Capoeira dancers on the lawn in the middle of the PCC campus and I am thoroughly enjoying the beat of their tambourine. I can’t help but think that one day, when I don’t live here anymore, I will miss Portland. I will cherish the memories and probably over-talk-it-up to anyone and everyone who wants to (and doesn’t want to) listen. I can’t help it. It is one of those places in the world (similar to some parts of Australia, in particular Brisbane), that I feel are an incredibly successful mix of U.S. and European lifestyle. It has been a good year and a half.

A story on NPR today talk about how disconnect people are nowadays, how we have fewer confidants and friends, and the author of the book (the interviewee) attributed it to the fact that today we (U.S. folks) move so often throughout our lives that we do not develop a deeply rooted community network. How true. Even just traveling to different places around the world or living somewhere for a few months or a couple of years, I have noticed how attached I can become to a place while remaining miserably lonely from a people perspective. Always wishing for the friends “back home” even though there is no “back home” the way that friends and family are scattered nowadays. Even purchasing a home doesn’t seem to be a lock-in for settling down. It’s all rather unsettling.

But I suppose I take away the charm of all of these different places (and the memories, though that sounds cliche) and that enriches my life as a whole.