“I like this place, and willingly could waste my time in it.”
As You Like It (II.iv.69)
Polonius proclaimed to Laertes as he prepared to leave Elsinore to return to university: “the apparel oft proclaims the man.” (Hamlet I.iii.74). Outward facing appearance, as the first thing others encounter, may indeed tell a (true or untrue) story. But what about the where (vs. the wear)? Does the place make the person as the clothes make the man? To what extent does our location shape our selves, and does our essence alter as we change venue?
I reflected on this koan several years ago as I left everything familiar behind and moved to England to study for a year. And pondered it again as I traveled back across the pond with a newly minted MA in Shakespeare Studies. The question taps on my shoulder every time I revisit my adopted home in Stratford Upon Avon.
Several studies, including one by the NIH “highlight the ways in which self-concept and place are interrelated. Place is critical to one’s sense of self - it directs behavior (when I’m in this place, I am this person and act this way) and is an active ingredient in self-concept (“I am my neighborhood” “I am this place”). Place changes underscore the complex interplay of identity and physical environment.” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4307016/#:~:text=Studies%20such%20as%20these%20highlight,I%20am%20this%20place%E2%80%9D).
I do feel like myself when I migrate between Stratford Upon Avon (SUA) and Westport. Yet at the same time, I feel decidedly different.
Here and There
If it is external differences that impact the internal environment, they merit exploration. I am most jarred by how very familiar everything in England is… and yet subtly and substantially not. Would I actually feel more anchored in myself if I decamped to, say, to someplace glaringly different like Nepal biannually? Would I cling to the life preserver of me in a more exotic sea?
So much about the trip to England, SUA, and me in it, feels so recognizable that I’m baffled that I feel different at all. I have set up my space there, less than a third of the size of my townhouse, similarly. In both places the kettle features prominently in the kitchen next to a tin of PG Tips tea bags; fraternal twin nightstands flank the white-linened full-size bed. Alexa plays soothing music for me in the evening and forecasts the weather in the morning. In both places, egress sits to my left; large windows to my right afford a view of trees in which mourning doves serenade me; if they coo in different accents I don’t detect it.
My evening and morning routines are so similar that it often takes me a few moments to remember where I am when I wake up. But the air has a palpably different feel; the flora looks the same at first glance (green), but is notably different. Magpies do not frequent my deck in Connecticut, and the robins only look tangentially related.
The language is the same, but, too, is different. My inflection instinctively trends upwards at the end of questions in the UK. I ask friends what they fancy, and report that I’m chuffed, knackered, and need the loo. I trade in my “z”s for “s”s when I recgognise something, and add a “u” when I honour someone. I try to remember to look the right way when crossing the street because they drive on the wrong side. I do none of this to be pretentious, but to blend in. I work very hard at not fulfilling every Ugly American stereotype. Just like I speak Spanish in Spain, or French in France, I speak British in Britain. It’s a gesture of respect.
So if everything is so similar (with minor deviations) and so comfortable (with minor exceptions), why do I feel so markedly different when I cross the ocean?
Can You See the Real Me?
I suspect that it has less to do with superficialities and more to do with both how others see me, and how I, in turn, perceive myself. With how the externalities affect my internal climate.
I cannot hide my nationality (nor would I want to), and that inevitably makes me a slight anomaly no matter how many scones I eat or Guinnesses I down; either as a novelty or a representative of this country tasked with explaining and/or apologiz(s)ing for all our worst qualities. But just as we might here, random people are more likely to strike up conversations with me there, wondering from whence I hail or what I’m doing there. That forces (in the best of ways) more frequent social engagement.
I feel calmer in England: the temperature, although not that different to that of the Northeast at any given moment, is more temperate. The lack of extremes on either end of the Celsius (and my persistent inability to convert it to Farenheit) means that I don’t freeze in winter. I rarely turn on the storage heater in my flat, which is a good thing because I don’t fully understand how it works anyway. Nor do I melt like the waterlogged Wicked Witch in summer. Despite the fairly universal lack of air conditioning, the mercury rarely spikes enough to need it, and it cools down in the evening. I dread the summer heat and humidity in my hometown like Shakespeare dreaded the plague. This more temperate external temperature keeps my emotional temperature range in check.
Without a car, I walk almost everywhere in SUA. I can access most of what I need on foot. Britain can sigh a sigh of relief at this, as I’d likely cause damage driving on the left. This eliminates the tension and near-rage that I experience on virtually every vehicular outing in Westport. Drives that took seven minutes when I moved there 27 years ago now take to infinity and beyond minutes thanks to an increased population, I-95 construction, and that demon app, Waze. In SUA I watch frustrated drivers on the Alcester or Birmingham Roads with detached empathy. Walking forces me to slow down and notice things: canal boats navigating the locks, Tudor structures predating our colonial forays, kitschy Shakespeareana everywhere. In Fairfield County any niceties whir by and blur in my endless sojourns up and down the Post Road.
I’m more engaged in England. Not to be married: socially; culturally. Since I visit for a month at a time, and because CV37 (Stratford’s postcode) is a Mecca of sorts for me, I cram my days with coffees, lunches, cocktails, and dinners to catch up with all the friends I see so infrequently. On my last visit I saw seven plays (the Royal Shakespeare Company is a seven minute walk from my flat), and visited several historic sites. And had endless conversations about things-Shakespeare, with people who are not just indulging my obsession to be polite.
While the New York Metro area does abound with similar diversions, many of the hyperlocal ones are, frankly, meh. Those further afield require a herculean effort and a small fortune to attend.
Yet even with these differences, which are not insignificant, I sense that the real alchemy in how I see and feel about myself lies more inside than out. Which is influenced heavily by how others see and perceive me. I’m not there long enough to irritate anyone or have them tire of me. It’s like coming home to a litter of Golden Retrievers: everyone seems genuinely and unconditionally glad to see me.
They listen and talk to me in equal measure. We reciprocate each others’ interest in each others’ lives and feelings, and talk about subjects beyond our kids’ activities. In discussing this conundrum with a good friend there, she mused, “Maybe it has to do with how we see you here, versus how they see you there. We see you as a Shakekspeare scholar.” At home, other than in the classes I teach, I’m a divorced, superannuated empty-nester. I could hardly get more irrelevant than that. So many of my identities, and with them my relevance, have evaporated like dew.
So is our identity an innate, fixed thing, as Carl Jung suggested in describing the Anima/Animus in contrast with Persona (personality): In simple terms, the individual’s “true inner self.”? (https://iaap.org/jung-analytical-psychology/short-articles-on-analytical-psychology/anima-and-animus-2/). Or does it fluctuate and morph in reaction to our surroundings and setting much like a Mimic octopus or chameleon? Can we or should we even be more “our true selves” regardless of venue, or does it suit us socially, psychologically, and even evolutionarily to go with the physical flow?
On one hand it seems obvious that it matters; pull the lens out for a long, high shot. We are all less than specks on a planet that is less than a speck in a galaxy that is less than a speck in a universe that may well be less than a speck in a multiverse. Yet most of us think and act as if our issues are of paramount importance in that universe, and are often willing to fight to the death (or at least honk loudly and flip a middle finger) to prove it. If we sat on the Starship Enterprise, or even a flight over the Atlantic, our attitudes might change with the altitude.
On the other hand, as New Yorker writer Kathryn Schulz said in a recent article (September 2, 2024), “the geography cure is seldom curative.” Even if the placebo effect kicks in temporarily. “You take yourself with you wherever you go,” said my wise, now gone, mom. Location may impact perspective; it arguably shouldn’t/mightn’t alter who we are at our core.
The magnitude of the influence might also vary by individual, depending on myriad other factors, such as genetics, upbringing, and environment. I know I feel like a different person in each place - so much so that it’s disorienting at times when I go back and forth - and I suppose it might come down to a philosophical and semantical and unresolveable argument about exactly how to define the self. It seems at least, given my limited biological and physiological knowledge, an unanswerable chicken and egg question. Or perhaps seeking one definitive answer is not so much futile as moot. Like the nature/nurture conundrum, it is likely a little of both. As a favorite economics professor answered about every question we curious undergrads posed: “It depends.”
I am still rummaging around in my tangled psyche for the answers. In the meantime, I continue to take myself with me wherever I go.
Great topic, well explored.