How are you doing? I hope you had a terrific weekend!
Last week I was talking to friends and some were really upset because of the traffic jam. Some complained about the noise, others about the waste of time, but it wasn't long before the subject got wider and people started cursing the city, period - not this or that, but the whole city. I live in *São Paulo*, which is indeed a quite chaotic, noisy and stressful place to be. Nonetheless, whenever I felt sad or upset and didn't want to be at home or in the school, I always had some places in mind where I could go and be really at ease and feel comfortable - in my case, it's a silly gazebo which is just in the middle of a very small square with some trees. I used to ask the gardener to let me go up the gazebo and then I'd just sit there and relax. I don't know why, but the place made me feel good: nothing attached me to it emotionally, it was just a place felt good about.
Given this experience, I started asking my friends whether there was any place in the city they used to go when they didn't feel like staying at home and wanted to get out a bit. To my surprise, I received many positive answers: from parks and squares to bars or pubs, there were a whole range of different places where people could enjoy themselves despite all their frustrations regarding the city and the everyday life. They founded solace in the most different places - some because of emotional reasons, others because they actually enjoyed the place for what it was.
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So, would you like, when time allows and you feel like reading and replying, to share your own experiences? Is there in the city/town/surroundings/country side where you live a special place you like to go to when you don't want to stay at home and wish to get away from the stress of the everyday life? Is there in the place you live a kind of solace where you guys find relief, comfort or even joy when things at home are boring or stressful and the everyday life is a bit demanding?
What does your city do for you? Has there ever been times when you felt embraced by your city or town? Are there places you like to go to - or you'd like to avoid going to... - for emotional reasons?
What do you think?
Let's try playing this little game?
I fully understand if you don't feel like playing because, first, yes, it's a bit intimate and, second, Queenzone is not made up of boring Yaras who keep writing as if people had all the time in the world to read it. Haahahaha.
I like many of you guys so much. I hope you're doing fine.
Take care, all right? I get worried about you guys. :-)
Best regards,
Yara
Philly Guy · Member since
My town smells like chocolate and has roller coasters. I could be doing a lot worse.
Then again, we don't really have the sense of community that the town I grew up in has. I think the reason is history. Hershey has only existed since the chocolate factory was started. West Chester, my old home, was founded back in colonial times. The history and the families that have been in the area for 200+ years make it so. For instance, in West Chester, they close the center of town several times a year for things like parades, and street festivels. Hershey, for whatever reason, doesn't do this.
steven 35638 · Member since
I shall not get too specific about the city I live in -- I like to keep a mystique about my whereabouts. At any rate, believe it or not, I like to walk about my college campus. It's a great place to both get away from life's problems and reflect upon those issues. Why you ask? Well, the campus is situated in a colonial area. So, it's quite refreshing to stare at the dozens upon dozens of beautiful colonial buildings. I always have my Zune mp3 with me on my walks. I usually take casual walks through a cemetary where hundreds of revolutionary veterans are buried -- and if you walk the entire length of the cemetary you reach a "dead end" that looks over the city. It's a lovely place for quiet reflection -- it's dead silent there! By the way, it's best to go there at night, the lights in the city are breathtaking. Well, other than the colonial surroundings, I much enjoy taking long car rides and visiting the local CD shops. I could spend hours upon hours walking up and down the aisles -- in fact I have.
So there you have it: Steve likes cemetaries and local CD shops.
john bodega · Member since
I'd like to tell the majority of you where I live, but I don't want the Mark David Chapman's of the forum coming to get me.
Winter Land Man · Member since
I like going to the covered bridge, if no one is there, just to listen to loud fucking rock music, or look at the water. Jessica and I used to go there together and get kinky. LoL... I remember a time we were getting kinky in my truck, and one of my friends walked up to the door with a flashlight, haha.
Janet · Member since
I have only lived in two places my entire life! Both are in Northeast, Ohio and very close together. The city I grew up in and lived in as a young married woman was a wonderful place to grow up. There were lots of children on my street and we'd all hang out and play together. In the summers I remember staying out late, catching fireflies and playing hide and seek in the dark. There was a local Dairy Queen where we'd get ice cream and a small shop that sold penny candy in big glass jars called the BigLittle store that we walked to everyday after school. There was a lot of community spirit and everyone supported the high school football team. The whole city would turn out for the homecoming parade each year. There were many local festivals throughout the summer, fireworks displays on the 4th of July, hundreds of trick or treaters on Halloween, and at Christmas, there would be a lighting ceremony down on the little downtown square. Santa would arrive on a fire engine and hand out candy canes to all the children. I am pleased to say that my son was born while we lived there, and he enjoyed much of the same things as i did as a little child.
The area I live in also has very distinct seasons, winters are long and quite cold and snowy, springs that are full of baby animals, new flowers, bright green grass and spring showers, balmy hot summers, and autumns that are crisp and cool with beautifully colored falling leaves.
When my son was 9, we moved to where were are now, only 7 miles from where I grew up! Another small town. We now live within two miles of the National Park System. There are tons of deer, squirrels, rabbits. cuyotes and waterfowl in my area. My husband and I love the park, the forest, and walking the towpath with our dogs. The towpath runs along the famous Erie Canal, and right through the park. Many miles long, it is very popular with hikers and bike riders from all over this area. We walk the towpath in various areas just about every day. It just makes me happy to be alive when I am walking there! This town is much the same as the old city I grew up in. Friendly, lots of community spirit. I love living here!
Syb Ringnalda · Member since
My village is in Friesland and it smells like cow dung...really! But I love it, 't platteland!
beautiful english village! [/QUOTE]
and they managed to get the view from my house at 1.45min to 2.15min plus they even filmed The Maid Nora's barnacled yellow bottom at 3mins :-]
Thanks for the replies. I'm serious, I read [b]Janet's [/b]post and I almost cried. It's so beautiful and full of tenderness and humanity: it takes a beautiful soul to appreciate all this beauty, Janet!
What about Joxer! Wow! This is something. I was stunned. It's just an amazingly beautiful place. Cornwall!!! Cornwall gave me so much trouble when I was a kid...because I always had trouble figuring out whether King Arthur was fiction or for real: I thought about it, and sometimes I got more inclined to the fiction "theory", and other times I'd stick to the "reality" of it - "Ah, his Kingdom did exist, after all". And then comes Cornwall, which was one of the main elements which puzzled me. Merlin, ok, fictional - I could figure that out. lol The sword, a bit far-fetched, but could be based on something real. But then there was the DUKE OF CORNWALL - serious, he makes his way in Mallory's novel, I think, and in one of those by Chrétien de Troyes. Cornwall, as you have just showed us, has many beautiful landscapes and many amazing historical sites. Cornwall did exist, and it existed beautifully in my mind: so they inserted a real, actual region in a fictional novel and then my mind got all tangled up. "Hmm, but why mentioning real places and scenarios which could be verified?". lol I was, and AM, that neurotic!
Steven, my dear! I found it very exciting your ways to get out of the everyday mess. All the landscape you describe seems to be really beautiful - colonial setting, great views, and...yes, record stores!!! Hehehe. All one needs to survive!
Folks, I loved the replies, really. It was amazing. Thanks to Syb Ryngnalda too, our new Queenzoner. I'm curious to know what's written down there in your signature, Syb: I'd like a word for word translation so I can show off to people here a bit. Hahaha. : -))))))
THANKS! I like you all a lot and, above all, thanks for contributing to the thread - I know it can be a bit intimate.
Thanks for your patience and good-will.
Love,
Yara.
JoxerTheDeityPirate · Member since
^ i did write a long and intellegent [for me] reply about 'myths and legends' of King Arthur and Merlin but my internet thought i was being too bloody clever for my own good and cut me off in my prime when i tried to post it so..
edited form:
check out
Tintagel Castle-home of a great Cornish King but was it Arthur? [see the movie Excalibur]. anyone who says Glastonbury has just been to too many hippie festivals there!
Merlin-a great druid by that name did exist and has just been named as a Great Scot [see BBC news for details]
Excalibur-i have it on my wall..whether its the real one,i let you decide :-]
lyonesse-this 'mythical land' did exist [research is proving],and is the land between Lands End and the Scilly Isles.petrified forests have been unearthed miles out to sea between the 2 pieces of land,thus giving more credence to the Arthurian legend.
check out St Michaels Mount as well for more historical intrigue [Charles 2].We in Cornwall always seemed to get involved in things we shouldnt lol
Bigfish · Member since
I live in Seville. It´s hot and there´s doggy do everywhere but at least I can pick my own oranges.
