I chose topic #69 as it’s something I’ve often contemplated: if I could work from anywhere (online? ;-)), where would I want to live and why?

I probably mentioned that I don’t like Day Job. I even tried to get rid of it when I was younger by subscribing to Overseas Jobs Express. Didn’t work back then, and now it’s kind of late. Nobody would hire a 45-year-old. BUT if I could live off my writing, I could then move anywhere, right? 🙂

Around 1998 I wrote a short story, Sanctuary (the title is in English, but the short story is in Italian, or I’d have copied and pasted it as post today) about a writer who, living off her royalties, spends the winter months in a chalet in the Alps under the snow, spring and fall she goes to Rome to talk with her publisher and deliver her manuscripts, and in the summer she travels to cooler places than hot Rome.

The English title was “stolen” from a manga (there’s no copyright on titles and ideas, remember? It’s only the execution! :-D) where they explained that “sanctuary is the place each of us builds inside to protect one-self” (rough translation from my Italian version), so in my short-story the protagonist’s “sanctuary” was her chalet. It was more an outside protection, but well… I’m not going to revise that story anyway! 😉

So, as I’m now working on that goal she had already reached so long ago, how has my view about places to live in changed since then? I still kind of like her solution. Or I’d stick to Europe, probably France, as I’m not too fond of English food. I’d certainly go north, as I’m the winter lady (Lady Ice in my one-shot comic, but in her case it’s an inner cold…) and hate the summer heat in this town.

But then, I’m still waiting for the border-less world I hope will soon come, so I won’t have to give (one of my) e-mail to win a Green Card at a lottery after two years (when I’m not interested anymore) and I will be able to travel without the security hassles – we won’t need those when the world is in peace, right? At that point probably anywhere would do… as long as it’s not too hot! 😀