"Take me home, country roads"

"All through this conversation his voice was growing slower and richer. More like the country voice he must have had as a boy and less like the sharp, quick voice of a cockney" - The Magician's Nephew, C. S. Lewis.
This, apparently, has happened to me lately. At least, under certain circumstances.  Someone pointed it out to me some weeks ago, and I was happy to see it in print this morning.  Perhaps, like the new King of Narnia (the voice in the above quote), I am affected by some magic, sometimes, some sort of wild power.
Nevertheless, it is fitting that my voice returns sometimes to that of the country boy. For I am, at the heart of it, just that. In fact, I was recently asked, "So, where are you from, exactly, with the sea, and the forest and the mountains?". I had, apparently, been rather hyperbolic in my stories about my youth, about my origins.
Although, the truth is not far off. I did grow up in the mountains (the appalachians, granted), and by the sea (le Fleuve, but the water is salty where I live).  The forest, well, it was more pastoral than primeval, but it was a sort of woods, a forest, and it had trees.  There are deer there, and rabbit, partridges and foxes, so it might as well be a forest, really.
And it is to this pastoral wonderland that I shall return, for the Christmas Break, in all my boonie-rat glory (since a someone recently took umbrage at my self-description of "red-neck", I'll try boonie-rat on for size. I like rats, so it is sorta apropos. They might not agree).  Winter is a wonderful time in Metis, where I hail from, so long as one doesn't mind crushing isolation.  And snow.  Armed, however, with second-hand cross country skis and borrowed boots, I intend to conquer the backwoods, snow and all.  And the presence of family, and the magic of Christmas, should offset the isolation.
Baked goods, and with any luck, a Christmas goose. Hot cocoa by the wood stove. Family dinners, Christmas Eve in the country Church (United, or Presbyterian, but who am I to complain).
Ah, the country. The mountains, the sea, the forest. I really am from there, and I am awfully glad when I get the chance to go back.