Exquisite torture city

There's something enticing about going somewhere you aren't familiar with.  Somewhere that you're a little overwhelmed.  A place that's somewhat familiar and yet different enough to tip you off your center.  New York City is like that for me.  Although I now have friends who live there and who could usher me around and keep me within  a certain comfort zone.

I've lived in Mexico, visited India, Scotland and Australia.  I felt that same bit of discomfort there.  But that was to be expected.  I was in a foreign country.  To feel that way in my own home country.... that is a special sort of exquisite torture.

And yet I continue to look for it from time to time.

I've moved around a lot, never spent too much time in one place.  I have friends who have lived in the same place for 20, 30, maybe even 40 years.  I envy them sometimes.  To have that consistency, to know the same people for so long, to have their environment embossed on their minds, their souls, so well that they know it down to their bones.

And now I've lived in this place for 15 years.  I'm on the cusp of knowing the place well.  And I start to think about finding a new place to explore.  I know I'll never know a place as well as if I had never left.  And I find my life richer for that.