I am feeling hideously miserable

The things I am leaving are the best things, I can't even describe how beautiful my life here was. And everything else is uncertain, I don't even know where I will live.

but think if you stayed right where you are as it is now rainy: it wouldn't be marvelous and fab after a while, it would be flat and tired (or you would go sludgy convincing yrself otherwise)

I know, but Wellington might be really dumm! After all Maryann doesn't live there! And I don't even have a BED!

Nothing's fine, I'm torn!

i left for vancouver from homwe for two years and it was good , i was lonley after a while and i grew up enough to deal with going home. So leave for Somewhere else on the South Island and live a great life and go back home every so often and you will be shocked at how much you have changed. How about Christchurch ?

The opposite of nostalgia is adventure (tho i agree adventures with a bed and mostly better than adventures w/o a bed)

that sound saucier than i intended it to

(and = are, sorry) (it is three o'clock after my party and everyone has gone home even gareth and i am tired and buzzed)

Going away from Dunedin is like breaking up with a boyfriend. If I went to Christchurch it would be like breaking up and moving next door. Plus it smells like old turnips in Christchurch.

So it's going to be Wellington and I am excited, but oh so scared! Nobody that I went through art school with really understands that Dunedin is maybe more special to me because I haven't much in the way of a family, so the ties and the home that I made for myself here are more important to me.

the opposite of nolstalgia is adventure... the opposite of nostalgia is adventure... the opposite of nostalgia is adventure...

rainy, but you already have Dunedin. It can always be home. Making another one can only mean more, not less.

But the ties you will surely keep. Yes the home thing is harder and may be a boring pain for a while — though you will (lame announcement alert) also meet new friends in Wellington. (Rainy you are surely brilliant at making friends.)

There is nothing we can say will make it unscary: but w/o adventures every now and then your imagination would go flabby.

I bet thsat some of what was brilliant abt Dunedin was that you were living it aware that it wasn't forever.

I'm all weepy now, so I should go before I say anything more dumm. But everyone here on ILE has to promise to stay here, so that there can be some constancy in my time of need.

If I'm lucky, some bogans on George St will throw another hamburger at me.

The healing properties of ILE strike again. Rainy you will be happier in your new home and you will have prescious memories whci hare important in life

All the good things have already been said by the Kind People, so I'll just echo -- fret not, dear Rainy. We'll not leave you. :-)

Rainy, the story below came from smh.com.au today. Very timely.

Here is my advice to you. When you move to Wellington, select your fragrances with great care...but try to enjoy your new home. Take sensible precautions and then relax.(You may want to keep your perfume receipts with you at all times- you never know when you might be challenged. But it is not compulsory.) ABOVE ALL DON'T PANIC.

On a positive note, I think we can safely assume no-one at Two Rooms restaurant will ever hiff semi-eaten burgers at you.

< An outraged diner left a New Zealand restaurant in a huff after the chef handed her a napkin and asked her to remove some of her perfume.

The chef at Wellington's Two Rooms restaurant, Jonathan England, said he introduced his wipe-it-off policy because diners could not appreciate good food and wine with lots of perfume on.

"Once or twice a year someone walks into the restaurant in half a gallon of $3 perfume wanting to take on a $30,000 wine cellar and good food - they never win," he said.

But diner Janet Hunt, out to celebrate her 48th birthday, was appalled and embarrassed by England's request and her party left the restaurant immediately.

"It was just so bizarre. The perfume is not the issue ... it is the pretentiousness of the chef, that's the issue. It is an outrageous and totally unacceptable thing to do," she said. Besides, her perfume cost $125 for a small bottle.

England failed to win support from other restaurateurs, with one maitre d' Steve Logan saying: "There is no way I'd ever, ever tell someone that they've got too much perfume on ... that is way over the top.">>

OK I'll move to Wellington. But seriously, you'll feel exactly the same about Wellington in a year. That perfume thing was ridiculous. She should have sprayed some in his eyes.

Wellington renamed Middle Earth. Beware of orcs.

I am about to do very similar and its been tearing me apart for weeks and weeks, the only thing driivng me is I feel I'm too comfortable here its too easy, so I'm following my head and part of my heart and moving to London, (for a while), but part of my heart will for ever remain here in sheffield. This does at least fill me with nervousness and excitement, and I believe its something I have to do to dave myself from intenrnal disapointment.

You have to ask yourself where next though, I am a consumate wanderer and I can't see my self stopping in London for more than a few years, but I have plenty of good reasons to stay there. Wellington sounds like it holds very little for you, if you have to make the break with somewhere you love, why not really make the break , the whole globe is your oyster.

Come to Melbourne and listen to Leonard Cohen mp3s with me.

oh and re: perfume and eating; i must applaud Jonathon England.

Difficult for me to comment, as every occasion in my life when I've had to move from A to B seems to have been either precipitated or accompanied by the death of someone close. In both major instances which I can think of, nostalgia was overcome by the sheer physical effort of moving things and the mental effort of sorting out finances, etc. So keeping busy enough to prevent these sort of thoughts from overpowering you is probably the most boring but maybe the most effective answer.

Congratulations on your awards, by the way! Don't think I've spoken to you directly on these boards before, but hope to do so again.

London's quite nice, have you considered it?

Say YES to drugs.

I moved last year away from London to Oxford, where I knew nobody. The distances probably aren't comparable but it is a wrench. You won't be happy immediately, if your experience is anything like mine. The most sensible thing I did in my first couple of weeks was invite a good friend to stay and have a great time with them - if you can do anything like that, do. It'll give you something to look forward to and it'll give you a happy memory of what might otherwise be a bleak month or two.

This thread reminds me of my good friend Ryan - I called him up at his apartment in New York yesterday, he's barely been there nine months. He originally planned to stay for two years, but now he's decided he wants to stay there forever. Forevah? Forevahevah. It's a far cry from merrie olde Essex but I'm really pleased for him - he sounded so happy.

It's surprising how quickly someone can put down new roots, although personally I'd advise visiting any would-be new home a few times first to get an initial affinity with the place.

I'm jealous actually. Starting over is exciting, it breaks me from my routines, and I'll find myself noticing the mundane. I'm too comfortable here and I miss that.

The hardest part of leaving a city is the realization that it will get along fine without you. It's hard to accept that your absence hasn't ground things to a halt. But this is also the best thing about leaving - you're not really free until you can seperate your identity from your locale. Distance creates perspective. But it is really really difficult right before you leave though, no question. Once you get to your new town, you can start to explore it and find the best used record store and make fun of the local accents in your head and all that. Packing up and saying goodbye can be sad, but just remember that you'll be back sooner or later.

I left the Bay Area and it hasn't been the same since. The city cries for me. But hah! I have found a new mistress in the great windy boulevards of Chicago, where even the women have broad shoulders and Veagan is a word for an alien from the Dog Star! As JM would say, change is what wards away the icy touch of mortality. Forward, rainy, forward! Like a meteor, hurtle and burn towards fate and cast yourself anew!

arf arf arf. you are all so lovely. I'm leaving on a jet plane today! I feel happy. And guess what, I think I might have a crush on all of you.