My mother was born in an English town called Luton. I was born in a Canadian city called Vancouver. But I was soon whisked away to grow up in Saudi Arabia, a country I could never call my own. Long happy childhood summers were spent in Luton and after university it became my semi-permanent home. So I claim it. Luton is my hometown. People outside England imagine quaint communities of cottages and cobble-stoned streets, jolly little freckled street urchins, witty tea-drinking adults, all watched over by the lord of the local manor from his mock Tudor stone castle. Some places in England are a lot like that.
Luton is nothing like that. It's stubbornly modern. We have a river (stream really) choked up with take away chicken boxes, no old buildings and bad race relations. The rest of England looks down on us. We look down on ourselves. It's sad. They've been working to give the place a bit of a face lift with some recent projects in the town center, but more than anything the place needs a good pep talk and a dose of self-confidence. Up the road in Harpenden and St. Albans, they like their town and they like themselves. Luton has a lot to learn.
But I have deep roots there and in the surrounding villages. I have family and good friends there. It's the closest thing I have to a home and that alone makes it the best place on earth.
Well, sort of.
2 comments:
Luton sounds just like the Detroit of England. It may be gray (grey) and gross, but it's home.
Luton, like Bakersfield, Calif. and many towns in New Jersey will never be the "best place on Earth," but it suits us anyway.
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