Thank you for this post. You captured and enunciated something I had been feeling for some time.

This morning I watched the Sigur Ros film "Heima" - the Icelandic band returns home and plays a series of free, unannounced concerts. It's an exploration of being at home in an out-of-the-way place, finding success externally, and returning to give something back. (It's an astonishing film, by the way.)

I found myself wishing I was from Iceland because it was at least place with its own identity, any kind of home to be proud of. What an awful, embarrassing thought - like somehow my own personality defects can be blamed on a derelict city.

Two things I can share about leaving Winnipeg: the first is that it gets harder and harder to go back, even for short visits. The thought of it almost causes an anxiety attack. (Well, maybe most people feel that way about their hometown.) This means you miss seeing those that are still there - like yourself - and that regret actually feeds the detachment.

The other is that, in over ten years living and working abroad, I have met exactly one person from western Canada (specifically Saskatchewan). I have never met another Manitoban.