Where Am I?

Image credit: Photo by si1very on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons

I was looking outside today and thinking of writing about my surroundings, but then realized (with a bit of a pang) that it's not something I write about here. I describe my internal life in great detail, but I take some pains not to describe my external landscape. Sometimes I am vague. Sometimes I am purposefully misleading. Always I am cautious about my anonymity.

My friend Ellie tells me she can tell by the way someone writes whether or not that person is conventionally attractive. She says people who grow up knowing that society likes the way they look have a different voice than people who don't. They don't need to describe themselves. I thought of that as I wondered if my setting describes itself, if the landscape around me infuses itself into my writing even though I try not to describe it directly.

Am I perched in a skyscraper listening to cars whiz past my window? Am I nestled in a cabin with the world hushed outside under a blanket of December snow? Am I peering out at the dark shadow of a cactus against the night sky or straining to see anything at all in an inky, rustling sea of withered prairie grass? Am I in a humid river valley or high in the mountains where that river is born? City, country or suburb? Wet, dry, cold, warm, temperate or extreme? North, south, east or west? And does it matter?

Does the story change if I walk Janie to school or a bus stop past graffiti tagged buildings or down a dirt road past a cow? Does it matter if Austen's school has 20 students or 200 or 2000? Is my husband different if he's a small town businessman or a big city executive? Would I be thinking differently if I were writing this snuggled under a fleece blanket in front of a fire or listening to a sea breeze fan palm trees?

Do our outsides affect our insides so that there's no escaping them? Do we become where we are? (And is anyone else thinking of Marta's musings on writing now?)