Rough and tumble, still. And they speak English, which is always good when you only speak English.

There is a younger guy at the bar who has talked lately of moving to Australia. The idea of getting up root and branch and moving somewhere else is still in the American Psyche. And in the psyche of the immigrants that come to America. So the American Psyche is found in other lands and identified by the decision to leave for America. There is a name for that kind of reasoning.

In a far but recent past, such people would strike out from the East and move West. And as the East caught up with them they would move farther West. Some still do: they move to California. For many, the California Dream is bigger than the American Dream. Some even dream of going further West: these people dream of Hawaii and a land of relaxation and beauty and pleasing weather, exotic, but exotic in a way where the English language can get you by comfortably. Hawaii: America, but not too much America.

Some of these Westward people made it to Seattle. By which point you are pretty much running out of land to go west, because: ocean. And, as such, Seattle has become a refuge from the East, and from the South: a lot of Californians move north to Seattle. Some from the south stop a little shorter, and stay in Oregon, usually Portland. Which at least takes a few more new arrivals off the congested roads.

Anyway, the younger guy at the bar who has talked lately of moving to Australia. Australia can have an Old West vibe, at least from several thousand miles away. Rough and tumble, still. And they speak English, which is always good when you only speak English. Again: see Hawaii.

But Australia: the dream of moving ever Westward now takes you halfway around the world. And they have the Aborigine History of sketchy actions, just like America and the Native Americans. So, again: Old West.

There is supposed to be good surfing there, too. But the younger guy at the bar who has talked lately of moving to Australia doesn't surf. But it does make the California and Hawaii similarities a bit more cohesive. When talking about Australia in English.


- james james

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