28.3.09

English Epiphany


Jesmond Dene Waterfall
Originally uploaded by julieb1975
Last weekend we had a really lovely day here in the Northeast - warm, sunny, gorgeous. Will and I decided to go for a picnic and walk in a nearby city park called Jesmond Dene:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesmond_Dene

I had a really great time in the park, and it's amazing to me that we live only a couple miles away from this beautiful oasis. We took about a 2 mile walk while we were there, and all I kept thinking was "this is why I live in England, this is why I love it here". For the last couple months I have been feeling insanely homesick and constantly questioning whether or not I can ever truly adapt to living in Great Britain. In hindsight I realise that the two biggest reasons for this anti-UK period I was going through were that I miss my family and that there is a serious - and I mean SERIOUS - lack of sun in this country during the winter. Unless you're a vampire, it is physically impossible to avoid letting the 'dark nights' of winter in the UK get to you. It's just not right to live somewhere with so little sun in the winter - I can't IMAGINE living in Alaska where they don't get sun for months.

Anyway, now that it's starting to brighten up, warm up and get pretty darn green around these parts, I am falling in love with the country a little bit more and missing the US a little bit less. Funny how that works....