“Living in the city makes you soft”, Daniel Auteuil’s old school friend tells him in the French film, Conversations with My Gardener. I hear that a lot – most recently from my dad and an old friend down from the bush. It’s funny but it nearly always accompanies the phrase, “Living in the city will kill you”; seems mildly contradictory to me.
Now,
let’s see. After twenty years living in the city I can still walk for more than
twenty minutes without complaining. Only two country friends, and none of my
country cousins, can say the same.
On
the subject of perambulation, when walking up the street my soft city stomach
isn’t turned by the sight of two men holding hands – or, god forbid, kissing. I can also behold a group of
Asians or Arabs and not suffer a paroxysm of fear and rage because our country’s fucked. Being served by a
woman in a bank, post-office or railway station causes me no anxiety about the
future of mankind.
But that’s all negative. What
else? In the city I was homeless for a couple of years before I really noticed –
Soft city winters are cold when you’ve got just one thin blanket and the
clothes on your back. Living in the city I’ve been clinically dead twice. More
than twice in the city I’ve had to batter somebody unconscious to preserve
safety, liberty ... or virtue. And this is just the stuff I’m willing to talk
about.
None
of this is boasting. I know plenty of guys – and more than one woman – who’ve
spent their whole lives in the city compared to whom I’m Tinkerbelle.
City
life is so soft and easy that no country pals or kin are ever here more than a
week before they start bitching about wanting to escape it.
I’ve
lived in both city and the bush. Each has its attractions and drawbacks. I’ve
met hard bastards and soft-cocks in both places. And I’ve never fallen for the
age-old myth that, in a country where the bulk of the population has always been urban, somehow the bush is
the real Australia.
So,
I break out in a rash if I use the wrong shaving soap. So, when I’m done I use
an after-shave moisturiser instead of slapping raw alcohol into my face till it
looks like an old saddle. So, I avoid the sun if at all possible. I’ll still
nail my soft-spoken city balls to the table next to any blowhard’s – country or city.
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