Two worlds

I'm living in two worlds. Either I'm in El Salvador, checking on the weather and the news and my friends in the north, or I'm in the northwest, checking on the news and my friends in El Salvador (the weather in El Salvador at this time of year is pretty predictable). In either place the internet makes bilocation seem almost feasible. Thirty-eight years ago, when I spent a year in Norway, the distances were clearer, the spaces more unbridgeable. I remember reading the Herald Tribune in paper copy, and listening to BBC news. Letters took a couple of weeks to arrive. People at home seemed very-far-away.

Now the two worlds jostle and jangle. My laptop shows photos from El Salvador on its desktop. I wake up in the mornings and take a few long seconds to remember what country I'm in and what day it is and what I might have to do in it.

The distances we have erased with such ferocious efficiency are real. They matter. I want to wake up knowing where I am and how I got here.