When I decide to move to a new place, which I have done many times, one of my favorite things to do is google that city or town. Not just where to live, or the best library, or the closest Target, but unique places to go and interesting factoids about the said city. I try to see as much as possible, so that, when I leave, I feel like I have fully experienced living there.
Over time I have realized that people who have grown up or been in a place for many years develop a stagnant attitude towards it. When I was in Jacksonville, Florida for instance, almost everyone I met said they never went to the beach (which, by the way, is a gorgeous one with powdery sand, beautiful waters, and free parking). It was sad to me that something that easy to get to, and that wonderful, was simply ignored by the people that could go as often as they wanted.
It is a cycle I have seen over and over again, in every place I have lived, and it is what creates this sense of staleness in life. That is why it is important to seek out the world around you, to be, what I call, a tourist in your hometown. Whether you live in a small town with not much surrounding it, or a huge metropolis complete with famous museums and grandiose shopping centers, you can have places to go. Take your camera and snap pictures of your local coffee shop, visit a crazy local diner, hike a challenging trail, see an interesting historical site, etc, etc. You don’t have to travel far; even a tiny town in northern Arkansas called Ozark, holds the Wakarusa Music Festival nearby.
All this said, I hope that all of us can break away from the humdrum of normal life and find something new, or at least something different, to explore than we would normally experience.
– E.M.B.
The Poet Vagabond 