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There are some questions that really cannot be answered. One of them is this: "which is better, to live in the country or the city?" Ask me that question when I'm stuck in traffic on the Washington Beltway, and I'll answer, the country. Ask me again, when I'm a three or four hour drive from a play at Kennedy Center, and I'll say the city.

Some people are fortunate. Their interests and personalities are such that a stable, specific environment suits their every need. My younger sister has lived in a small rural community for her entire life, and cannot imagine living in the noisy, crowded environment of a city. I have a nephew, on the other hand, an artist who lives in Manhattan, who gets cabin fever whenever he visits me in suburban Maryland; calling it a provincial backwater.

I swing like the pendulum of a grandfather clock. When I'm trying to concentrate on my writing, no place is more conducive to the flow of creative juices than the deck of my semi-rural home, with nothing but the sound of chirping insects to keep me company. On other occasions, I need to have the vibrant song of the city streets. That is where I do my research, watching the pedestrians and drivers, and fellow commuters on a crowded subway train. I get most of my best ideas for articles and stories while commuting to and from work in the morning. The characters I observe are real people who form the basis for subsequent characters, sometimes without the need to even modify them. In the country, there is a sameness that is comforting, but it is in the city that you encounter the vast kaleidoscope of humanity from which most literature springs.

When I've developed ideas, I then go back to the country to flesh them out on the page. For that exercise, I need the quiet and sameness of a rural setting. The only noises I hear, other than the birds and insects, are in my head. The city stimulates ideas, characters and incidents; but the country stimulates creativity. It provides the quiet space needed to transform the ideas, to put flesh on them and manipulate them in ways that will hold a reader's attention. I got the idea for this piece, for instance, while driving to a lecture engagement in the city, but it didn't really take shape until I was back sitting on my deck, watching the full moon over the tops of the towering trees in my back yard, and listening to the chirping of the crickets and the kettle drum sound of mating frogs.

City or country; it's really a matter of preference. Thank goodness, we still have the freedom of choice.

Learn more about this author, Charles Ray.
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