Dropping to 22nd Place?
What is it that makes a city a great place to live? It all really depends on what you consider to be the most important influencers on your life. It could be crime, weather, cost of living or something that MoneySense Magazine calls "Buzz". Or it could be something all together different.
In the last month or so two different city rankings have come out. One is a listing of Canadian cities in MoneySense magazine. The other is Mercer's annual ranking of world cities. These are the kinds of lists that sell magazines because they satisfy the logic and organization that all of us left-brained, A-type personalities (that have dominated the world recently) have.
But really what makes a place better than another? Can you truly be objective? Or does it always end up being in one's mind and therefore excruciatingly subjective.
The reason this is coming up as an ideeah is my pending move back to Montreal. According to MoneySense I will be moving from the 5th placed Canadian city to the 100th placed city. According to Mercer I will be dropping from 4th place city worldwide to twenty-second. Ouch! That hurts. Maybe I should reconsider. What do you say left brain? How about you righty? Agree?
One can pick away at numbers. How is that the 4th place city in the world is ranked 5th in Canada? Even funnier that the 100th place city in Canada is considered 22nd in the world. How large or small were the cities being ranked? Did they include metropolitan areas or just the exact city limits? Is a pick-pocketing considered a crime or do you have to be charged with assault of some sort? What is MoneySense's "buzz" exactly? The number of music venues? The number of places you can ski? Who knows.
One has a much harder time picking away at individual experiences rooted in feelings and emotions. The sweet smell that smothers the city in the spring. The one that made me want to move. The feeling of suffocation due to the never ending talk about money and worth. The one that made me want to move. The desire to leave your past behind and strike out on your own - to differentiate yourself from your tribe. The one that made me want to move. The potential for a career boost. The one that made me want to move. Or just some unidentifiable feeling. The one that made me want to move.
I may be moving from 4 or 5 to 22 or 100. But really I am moving to a place that my instinct tells me I need to be now. A feeling. A right-brained activity. And that makes it number one, regardless of what the type-As might say.
don't know why....people break that way
they have their reasons I am sure
whatever they may be
-Too Many Cooks
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