Being Unfair

Until I was in my late fifties I had never seen the United States east of the Mississippi.  Then, thanks to the kindness of friends who invited me to stay with them, I lived for several months, winter though spring, in Connecticut/Massachusetts, and a  couple of years after that, from the first of January through the middle of July, I lived in Columbus, Georgia.  In both instances I saw wonders which I will treasure in my heart till my final expiration date:  The city of Boston, tout d'abord, is as delightful, charming and pretty a city as San Francisco.  At any rate, there is an air of similarity between Boston and San Francisco that would enable me to live comfortably in either, which is somehow like the livable air of Rome and Paris--and of Milan and Zürick, now that I think back upon it. Of course, as an American and a Transcendentalist, it thrilled me to visit Concord Village and Walden Pond and the Emily Dickinson house in Amherst. And to have heard the endless, prodigal, infinitely varied descant of a for-real mockingbird in April, in the heart of the ancient oak forest that is Columbus, Georgia, is to have experienced something so deeply meaningful and beautiful that there are no words to describe it.  

That said, with my delicate, western-bred susceptibility to atmosphere and humidity, I was never quite comfortable out of doors in the eastern United States--even in the sweetest spring time, the moisture in the air lay heavy in my lungs.  And I was shocked by the bitterness of winter in New England, as I was by the brutality, heat and humidity, of summer in Georgia.  Once about the middle of July, I walked outdoors in Columbus, Georgia, beyond the aid of life-supporting air conditioning, and finding myself utterly prostrated, I exclaimed, "O God, take me somewhere where I can be comfortable out of doors!"  And (firmly guided by my guardian sylphs) I bought a one-way bus ticket to Eugene, Oregon, where indeed, the first thing I noticed when I got off the bus, was that I was comfortable, and that I could breathe.