California Here I Come

My re-introduction to this landscape of my childhood has been a lonely one. But I suppose this is a gift in disguise; a time to contemplate. For one, I don't understand how one can survive in greater California without a car. New York City is a microcosm of self-sufficiency. You feel like you are conquering the world on one small island and its outer regions, thanks to the flawed yet pretty damn impressive magic of the MTA. California is hostile to walkers. No not streetwalkers, but people who travel on foot. Unfortunately, that's the only way I've been able to get my 40 Ozers and cigarettes, plus the occasional bag of popcorn or can of soup. (This is sounding terribly more pathetic than it needs to, but yet, I have felt sorry for myself in the last couple of days.)

That and the room for desolate street spaces bathed only in the light of a streetlamp. I think about serial killers. I think about what lurks in the shadows. I miss people. I miss the activity of a thrush of crowded commuters on a street corner. Either extreme allows someone to live largely in their head: masses of people make me revert to my imagination and emptiness of landscape and personal space makes me worry about what has gone wrong in the world.

I guess I am a more social person than I account for. I guess I forget that places are very different in simple ways but also much the same. I am searching for the sameness, but continue to move. Over and out, above and beyond. About.