The ride that becomes routine can quietly change which places feel close enough to belong to you.

A city is not the same size for everybody. It is shaped by which trips have become ordinary to you, and a route taken twice a week stops being travel and starts being neighbourhood. That is why a new bus line or a bicycle can enlarge a life without anyone naming it as a change. Belonging follows habit more closely than it follows distance.

Think of a place you like but treat as far away, and work out what it really costs in time. Make the trip twice within a month and see whether it starts feeling like somewhere you go rather than somewhere you visit.