Traveling really makes you understand where you came from. Being a small town boy from North Carolina, I thought Atlanta was like a mecca for liberal people. Atlanta pales in comparison to Seattle for liberal qualities. They recycle everywhere here. Pedestrians actually have the right of way. Public transit is friendly and makes sense. It is madness.
I realize now that Atlanta is like the gay uncle who is still married to his female wife and sometimes sneaks you a dirty movie, while Seattle is your gay cousin who performs as Lady Gaga every night at the bar.
The number of bookstores alone is staggering. People joke about there being a Starbucks everywhere but the bookstores outnumber them. These are used bookstores too. Lovely little untainted treasure troves of stacked out of print paperbacks for sale at ridiculous prices. I had to buy another piece of luggage to put all my books in. I picked up Eric Stanton, Roger Zelzany and more Fu Manchu novels than I care to admit. I think my Librarian characters might have to move here.
They also don’t tell you how many chocolate stores there are here. This is how society was meant to operate. I eat dinner somewhere, then walk over to the confection shop and buy something incredibly delicious for under two bucks. I had a vanilla caramel that tasted like Venus came in my mouth. Oh man, it was divine.
Tonight I head back home. I do miss something they don’t import here called sunlight. I seriously miss my cats. I miss sweat tea something fierce. I miss being able to write at my computer instead of this lovely laptop.
I’ll see you next week.