(Anglo) Saxon the City

Bonjour Mes Amis,

After a sizeable hiatus I am returning to the blogosphere - so rumours of my Major Tom like departure are greatly exaggerated.

However, we weren't far off there, as I was in bed for a week after landing back in Seattle (I'm skipping over London as this is, after all, called Dor'n in the USA!). I don't think it was the Schvine Flu, as I didn't have a temperature, but I was virtually unconscious for 4 days straight - fun!

I'm back up and running now though - almost literally. Have been working during the day (thanks Fresh Minds!) and rehearsing every evening from 7 -10.30pm. Got the day off today though, so am relaxing - after taking Kira to the airport at 5am...

Since returning to Seattle, rising from my sick bed, and being forced to watch Sex and the City many times over, I have been struck by the fact that I am pretty much the anti-Carrie. For a start, we live on opposite coasts (yes I am aware she's not real...), then there is the fact that she likes buying shoes, whereas I own 4 pairs - two with holes in. She drinks cosmo's; I drink beer. She spent most of her twenties and thirties single; I married young. She is incredibly fashionable; I am not. She is a talented writer...

Anyway, after thinking through all this, I couldn't help but wonder; while I wouldn't fit in in New York, with all those fabulous people catwalking through life, will Seattle let me be a Saxon in the City?

The evidence so far is pretty good - plenty of pretty down-to-earth bars and restaurants, the Northwest's penchant for ale, football (association and rugby) available on the TV - but we need to go deeper than that. What defines the Anglo-saxon more than anything else? If aliens were to look at Britain from outer space, how would they define our psyche (or blargenhaaaat in their language)?

Well, if the defining French characteristic is Ennui - a deep-set boredom which results in them treating everyone and everything with disdain (Eurodisney - poof!), then the defining British characteristic is surely Enn-wee: a torpid notion that we will piss everything up the wall, which generally results in us actually doing so (for many this is literal as well as metaphorical, as they get drunk after said disaster and urinate in public).

Witness British sport. Despite many a half-hearted rallying cry, we still approach most, if not all, national sporting events with the enthusiasm of a Captain going down with his ship - we know it won't be pleasant, but it is our duty to stay the course to the bitter end.

This is not the case in most of the US - as fanatical devotion to the national cause (and local causes) is rampant. Not so in Seattle! Though there are some die-hards, I have found the same attitude toward the local teams - the certainty that they will be crap but the dutiful subjection to their crapness. So the Saxon in me feels at home.

Another joint cause is the weather. It is terrible here at the moment. So Seattlites moan about it. Who else do we know who does that??

Finally, self-deprecation - the necessary companion of Enn-wee: stave off disappointing others by not making them expect much in the first place. Here we reach a bit of a stumbling block - there is still the American desire to push one's own agenda. However, it seems to be much less prevalent than in other parts of the US - so I'll give it a half mark.

2.5 out of 3. Not bad. But there is a difference. Somehow, the denizens of Seattle seem able to hold onto this attitude without either a) self-destructively binging on alcohol; or b) turning grumpy. So there is something not quite Saxon about this city...

Perhaps it is the Viking sensibility (Seattle has strong Scandinavian connections) which overrides - the pioneer spirit allowing fatalism to morph into pragmatism. This has it's downside too (Seattle is starting to feel a little like the Wild West with a number of tragic police officer murders continuing), but the upside is quite appealing.

So, using the Carrie Bradshaw past tense, although a Saxon I was starting to see things from a different angle.

DD out