On visiting

We all wish to visit the spots that appeal to particular parts of our personalities. Every place has a romanticized appeal to a part of our character, and it's those parts of our character that we project on the city or country. This romance is fertilized with stories and descriptions acquired through the media or through people we know who've been there.

For example, I wish to visit San Francisco and imagine it a certain way (heady, free-lovin', very liberal, sunny all the time) even though the rational parts of myself understand that the whole city isn't like that – but if and when I do go there, I'll go to stroke off that portion of my personality. It will be either satisfied or disappointed, but whatever the result, I'll have a new understanding of myself.

So it goes...