Anywhere but here and now

I love the second half of the 18oo's why couldn't I have just been born then...or the 20's. Paris. England. Moscow. St. Petersburg. Kyoto.

I mean think of this. Walking down the streets of Moscow, powder like snow gathering on your elegant deep red cloak. Underneath it's protective warmth, your wearing the most beautiful dress. With all it's lace and frills, it's bows and streaming ribbons. A corset that hides your imperfections. Hair piled up strands escaping in curly waves framing your face. Pearls, flowers, rings all the beauty you could ever imagine. And the parties. Intellectual conversations about politics, playing the games of upper class society. The height of Russian society of all time.

Or Paris. The night clubs open till the late hours of dawn when the sun begins to rise over the city of lights exposing all it's magnificent. The light and fashionable dresses, and fine suits. The shoes. The music and arts. Wandering around Paris's in and outs, the alley ways and high roads. Never knowing who you will meet next, what writer or artist will as you to model for him...

London the impoverished city where pickpockets run in the streets. Society's dysfunction, where the upper class look down upon the street urchins. Peaking the revolutions. The bitter sweet freedom that comes with poverty.

Japan. Take Nagasaki, the geisha districts booming with life so different and mystifying. The elegant way people there function. So similar to western culture but in a way so much more refined. The plays, tea houses, festivals. Walking down narrow streets that are teeming with this peaceful life style so interwoven with traditions and cultures. The simplistic outer beauty of it all.

America...well we're pretty bad off compared to the rest of the world but there was always Detroit. Gangs. Before the city fell to it's ruin. The hometown of moat-town and blues. An American heritage centre, of stories buried deep in the unfinished bricks of the Masonic temple. Nearing towards modern times, early 1900's. Prohibition, the Purple Gang, riots, the pure insanity of it all. The adventure.

Why was I not born in one of these times, one of these places. Their stories burned into my mind by history teachers. Why now? And here? I mean this isn't even Detroit! For god's sakes...will my story of this century ever be told?