Dear Oracle: Where is the most comfortable place to live?

Artwork: Ragnhild Aarvik’s painting and photo, mixed by the Oracle

Dear Oracle,

Where is the most comfortable place to live?

Regards,

Lise

Whoa! Lise. What a fun question. Then I must ponder; what does it mean to be comfortable? Comfort, as I see it, is a tricky creature – a two edged sword. If we put Maslow's hierarchy of need aside for a moment, it seems like things always have to be 'just so', does it not? Like a cat taking its time pacing around in circles to find the perfect position to lay down. Comfort is a tailored need which differs from one being to the next – from one moment to the next. Not too little, not too much. We need a certain body temperature to be comfortable, we need it to be really, really quiet sometimes (can everybody please shut up?). Some of us need to rearrange the furniture in order to be comfortable in our homes – like there is something really disconcerting with the placement of that couch. Others couldn't get off that couch to move it if you paid them. And then there is the draft. That loathsome draft! Not to mention the sweltering summer heat, making it impossible to think. And the uncomfortable chair one always seems to end up with at dinner parties. It seems the older a person gets, the more stuff one buys to escape being uncomfortable. A padding of some sort, to shield us from life's hard edges. But does life not begin at the end of our comfort zone? (At least according to Neale Donald Walsch's tête-à-tête with God). And are we not all victims of scrolling ourselves into comfortable numbness – hello...hello...hello...is there anybody in there? But apart from our constant, fluctuating physical cravings, we also need (as Maslow points out) love and belonging. One might add; we need to be comfortable in our bodies, we need to settle into ourselves, and feel accepted (and dare I say celebrated) for who we are, at the core - for our inner weird and wonderful beings. For some, this means that the most comfortable place to live would be anywhere as long as it is in a big city, for others it would mean the opposite – staying in the comfortness of familiarity, in the town one grew up. That is why so many people end up settling down in dull places – because that is where they find comfort and belonging, and not in, for instance, a quaint mountain village in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland, overlooking Lake Maggiore – sitting on a knoll, conversing with a fox.

Then of course there is the question of what is meant by place itself? What makes a place 'a place'? What makes, let's say, a mountain village in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland, overlooking Lake Maggiore, a damn near perfect place to live? The architectural thinker Christian Norberg-Schulz writes that it is first and foremost the relationship between the sky, the mountains and earth that creates and identifies a 'place'. Vernacular architecture, built by hand from locally sourced materials (wood, stone, straw, clay), create a distinct, uniform aesthetic of being rooted in place. One might add, similar to how other animal architects operate, like ants or beavers or birds, vernacular architecture forms a logical aesthetic of place where economy and ecology (which has the same etymological root by the way, eco = greek oikos meaning home management/and home logic) comes together to create a kind of natureculture vibe. Schulz wanted these site-specific villages to be studied and used as models for contemporary housing and city planning, because these are places that make us feel comfortable.  

But hey, if you are asking me where my most comfortable place to live is, I have quite fond memories of living in the womb or in a nudist colony in the mountains of the Italian speaking part of Switzerland, overlooking Lake Maggiore.

Me, the Oracle, being in great physical shape (I have excellent bones), I like to live in places with a great view, where I can climb a lot, pick fruit outside my window, and also have a small (but not insignificant) infinity pool. I like to live in stone houses with three different doors for three different lovers, a rage room, a sulking shed and a music room. But if you were to ask a grain of sand where the most comfortable place to live is, she might say: ah, deep in the Sand Dunes on the Curonian Spit. A polar bear, a lactobacillus in the gut microbiome of Michael Pollans' stomach, or a rich housewife of Beverly Hills would all have very different ideas of what it means to 'live comfortable' –and where this might be. Then there is the dung beetle, which finds great comfort and satisfaction taking residence in a hot, steaming pile of grass-fed cow manure. In fact, I met a dung beetle once. A happy little creature rolling along with his dried dung ball. Just listen to his Whitmanesque poem: 

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

For what I digest you did excrete,

For every turd belonging to me as good and rich and potent, once belonged to you.

I roll and I roll and invite my soul,

I roll and loafe at my ease observing a plop of cow manure.

Then there is Space. As Sun Ra once said: Space is the place. What would it take to be comfortable in Space? Apparently a cave has now been discovered on the Moon. Perhaps that would be a comfortable little nook to relax in, instead of bouncing around all the time. Have you thought about living on the Moon? And speaking of you, how comfortable are you within yourself, by yourself? Because as a wise man once said; wherever you go – there you are. If, let's say the off chance you are in the forestry profession, and work and live in a fire lookout tower overlooking the woods of Oregon, I would imagine you have some experience with being by yourself, pondering life's great mysteries. If you can be comfortable by yourself as well as with others, combined with a necessary mindset of gratitude, I believe you are already on your way to fulfillment and comfortability wherever you may roam. 

 Artwork: Ragnhild Aarvik 

But you know, I also feel a sense of eco-grief in your question. Or perhaps it's just my own eco-grief, that haunting feverish feeling I cannot seem to shake. Where to run? No place to run really. Because wherever we go, there we are. So; find resilience in adaptation, cherish the days that are good. 

Be good.

And do good.

And vote, I guess.

And remember to give thanks to the fireweed, that beautiful wildflower that rapidly grows and colonizes burnt out places, such as bombed out craters or after volcanic eruptions. They rush to fill these wounds in the landscape with colorful ribbons of fuchsia pink and blood orange. They thrive in these desolate places. And after the bees have come to retract the fireweeds' nectar with their hairy tongues, they make a delicious, spicy fiery honey known as the champagne of honey – the finest there is. So go where you feel you are most needed, find a way to thrive, even in the most desolate times, and if all things fail; bring with you a bottle of Southern Comfort. 

Sincerely, the Oracle of yore