Some years go out with a bang, others with a whimper. Last year was the one- both an extraordinary relief to start over again, and a horrible upheaval at having to say goodbye to so many people I’d really come to love. This year is the other. There are certainly people I will miss- SA and Shamsi in particular- but no one whose life was so intensely tied into mine. The queer thing about last year was that, as soon as everyone was gone, life got very calm and quiet- in fact, this has been one of the most peaceful years of my life.
The thing about autumn, and perhaps the reason I have always hated it, is because it’s when things change. Autumn is when life usually finds some way to go caddywampus, and I don’t do change, not gracefully at least. It’s like watching a storm roll in, standing in a field and just waiting for the lightning to strike. When it hits, it still hurts, but you at least knew it would happen. This year has been pretty classical, but after a year of nearly perfect calm, I’ve been able to pick myself up and dust myself off quite readily.
At this point I have been in York for two years. A whole lifetime has been packed into those two years- every extreme imaginable. What amazes me is that in that time, my feelings about the city haven’t changed a particle. If anything, I love York even more than when I first got there. Not one of the last seven hundred plus days that I’ve been here has gone by without my pausing for a moment to realise who fortunate I am to call this place home. Most remarkably, when things go wrong, rather than wanting to run away, the city has a way of wrapping me up and comforting me. This more than anything tells me that York is indeed where I belong. I hope that never changes.
[P.S. This brings not only the year but this blog to a close. It will be going onto a readers-only policy, so if you want to access it in the future, or read backlogs, please email me and let me know and I will send out the necessary emails.]
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