Last Day, Long Beach.

It's my last day here in LA, and I'm delaying leaving. It's been a wonderful trip, the freedom, the lack of phone calls, the sheer vacation of it.

I've had a number of what I term as vacation moments, the moments you have in mind that make you remmeber your vacation above all else. I have captured some of them, someof the others, I still need to capture. I didn't write as much as I would have liked, but really, that's ok. I didn't want or need the structure of a schedule to have to adhere to, for that would somehow remove all the aspects of being away.

I've discovered places I would like to live here, ideas for stories, the ever changing landscape and fashionable districts, and that my memory can still be a as vivid as reality.

I've got enough furniture in the car that I won't even be able to sleep in the car on the way back, which affects how I go back, namely going to Moab/Canyonlands. I'll have to see how that pans out. I'd like to ride my bike in the canyonlands, but that's merely a nice extra. NASA engineers have a term for their space missions, and that's 'Mission Objectives.' Once the primary mission was suceeded, everything else is fluff, extras. I've done what I needed to by coming out here. I've decompressed, seen the beauty of the world, started to notice the small things, the vignettes of the world that make it so unique to be in. I've realized dreams of things I've had for years, and also left just enough of them undone, in order to still hold LA as a destination for me.

I've listened to music that I've always pictured myself listening to out here. I've been to the beach, ridden the beach walk on my bike, gone to Catalina, the LACMA, seen the Queen Mary, driven in rush hour traffic, been a small part of LA, if only for a short time.

It's different, traveling someplace on pleasure, rather than business, I've noticed. Obviously you can't expense everything, but there are other subtleties too. It's your own car you have, with out of state plates. You don't really have anyplace you have to be at any particular point in time. Part of you feels unfufilled, like you really didn't do everything you need to, but some of that is simply becuase you haven't shared it with anyone yet, except over the phone.

I'll miss LA, the smell of the smog, the warm air, the ever-present vitality, the fact that here, in this vast city, is where much of the thoughts of the world are guided, shaped, and driven. Though you don't have anything to do with it, you still feel part of it. It's the city as a rule, no matter what city, has such an allure. You're where the action is, to be cliche. Not removed from it, in some small town, waiting for it to come to you.

You want to see culture being made, you go to Universal Studios, or down Wilshire Blvd, where all the record companies are. There's something in the air, an electricity if you will, that lets you know you are someplace that has the power to make something. The midwest, or even the west, doesn't have that. Other places have beauty, mountains, rivers, etc, but they're remote.

It'll be nice to go home, it always is after vacation, but it's saddening to leave here. It's been invigorating, helped me regain something I thought I had lost along the way, but I now know it's still there, and starting to come back out. That part of me that sees the world for what it is, for it's stories, for it's beauty, for it's seamier side. My imagination has once again been piqued, and my eyes reopened.

I bid you farewell for now LA, I'll be back.