With our book due dates looming, Joie and I decided to take off for a country house that her mom’s work uses for retreats during the weekends. It’s beautiful out here—rolling hills, big open fields, no other houses for miles. We passed a dairy farm on the way to the house and the cows frolicking in the field were adorable. But as soon as night came, I started to feel super creeped out. And this is something I’ve always noticed about myself—being in the country in general freaks me out.

I have this theory that there are two kinds of people—those who are more afraid of country things and those who are more afraid of city things. I definitely fall into the former category (long stretches of deserted highway are one of those images that reappear in my nightmares), but I have met many people in my life who are very much the latter. Last night while, sitting on the porch listening to bizarre nature noises around us, I had this idea that which one scares you really comes down to whether deep down you believe that people are intrinsically good or that human nature is intrinsically bad. If you think that people are by nature good, you like streets where others are always in view, you enjoy living in a tiny apartment where other people are 10 feet below and above you. If you think people are by nature nasty, you’ll feel much more at ease in a house like this where there is no sign of others for miles.

Thoughts?