This trip has reminded me, we’re very much a country divided

Having spent so much time in New York, I forgot about just how divided England is – the north-south divide is older than the US itself, writes Holly Baxter

Dodgy head? You want your own sparkler... (Getty/iStock)

As I prepare to return to the US after my whistle-stop tour of the UK – busily sticking Covid PCR tests up my nose, sealing them and posting them off; bundling up my wedding shoes to take to my final bridal gown fitting in Manhattan; organising whether or not my cat in New York has his favourite food, while also leaving my cat in the UK in the care of my mum – I’m amazed by how quickly I managed to become a Little Englander again.

In the US, you get used to talking about the whole of the United Kingdom in broad strokes, talking about Brexit as a nationwide phenomenon and “British culture” as if we have any semblance of a monolithic identity. But, of course, as this trip has reminded me, I should know better. Even within England, we’re very much a country divided, one where north and south have a bitter rivalry that goes back much further than America has ever even existed.

To illustrate this divide, it’s probably best to summarise some arguments I’ve had with my dad in Newcastle while I’ve been here. They include: whether or not chicken should be kept in the fridge (no, according to him, because a bit of bacteria is “good for you” and “anyway, do you think I had a fridge when I was growing up?”); why my postmodern wedding cake looks like “a piece of cement” and I’d be better off buying three tray cakes from Asda; why anyone who owns a dishwasher has become a slave to modernity, robots, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and capitalism; and why I should run a meat raffle at my wedding (it’s what it sounds like. Side note: I’m a vegetarian.)