Living vs Traveling

About a month before I took the hop across the pond, I was talking to a friend of mine about what it meant to “live” somewhere.  He studied abroad in London, and after he got back to the states he was told that studying abroad did not “count as living there.”   He and I both disagreed, but that raised an interesting question: when does it change from “I traveled in Ireland” to “I lived in Ireland?” 

There are any number of metrics that could be used to distinguish the difference between living and traveling.  He was of the opinion that if you pay rent in a place, then you have lived there.  Since then I have asked a few people and have gotten mixed answers, I heard anything from knowing the names of 5 locals to cooking your own food.

I did an exchange program in Germany in high school and looking back on it I don’t think that I really lived there.  Honestly that is just a feeling.  When I compare that to being in Ireland, it feels a lot more like I am living here now than I was then.  That may be because I will be here three months as opposed to three weeks, it may be because I never went off exploring by myself. 

This is clearly a complex and subjective question that is very difficult to judge… blah blah blah. The bottom line is we all have different ways of knowing when we have lived in a place.

So what’s my metric?

Toilet Paper.  It plays a vital but often overlooked role in everyday life.  If you travel somewhere you are generally provided with it, but when you live in your own place, you have to fend for yourself.   

Thanks for reading and have a wonderful day,

Willie

PS Did you catch the pun?