where ya at

poet steve tills has logged some time here in northern california. in fact, i believe steve met jim mccrary when both were students at sonoma state. steve writes about being in a california state of mind here. as he says he'll probably die in ny state he also lives in california.

don't we all live physically in one place while living else where too? i do at least. like steve who says he thinks he'll die in his natal place i probably will die in mine too. yet, i've always thought of myself as a citizen of the world. not a man of the world, which has differing connotations and resonances. i mean a citizen of the world. a person who thinks of himself as a member of the human species in all its guises and manifestations. and even perhaps being at home potentially every where.

at any rate, lately i've been in a sweden state of mind. over the years i think of it as my country also. my connection to the country resides in anna's side of the family where her immediate family members with the exception of her mother, live mostly in stockholm. and now anna's mother, annalena, and myself share the same fantasy: buying either a summer house or a flat for extended family stays.

who knows about that. but i've been thinking about sweden as if i've lived there for many years. the time i've logged in the country amounts to very little. but does it matter for it feels like a second home. i do think where we live is more than the place where we take physical posession. i'll die a californian -- i'm pretty sure. i can't think of a better place for it. i love my native city. i really do and i'm past the age for tragic romantic notions of running away into the abstractions of what we called in school 'the real world'. sac is real enough, believe me. but as i am a native of california i live in this world and i am also, i say, swedish too.