San Diego

When you leave the apartment complex and make a right hand turn, you’re traveling on Knapp Avenue. It’s not really a real street so to speak. Coral Bay is an apartment complex about a ten minute drive from the famous Pacific Beachfront of San Diego.

California seems to be the confirmation of so many things that I;ve been led to believe. Things that I’ve been led to believe both good and bad. When a buddy came to pick up Kyle tonight he had a story about he had been held up at gun point and talked quickly about how he was told to surrender his wallet and anything that was in his pockets. This may not be south central LA, but its not Winona either.

A couple blocks down Knapp Street – there really isn’t a set street pattern, just a few blocks of depth that mark out the apartments – there’s an old Ford SUV next to the sidewalk. There is something I can’t quite put my finger on about this vehicle.

This morning I walked a couple miles down to Mission Bay Park. A plethora of people were out walking or pushing strollers around the cement jogging pathways. There are clean restrooms every quarter mile or so along the path. People seem to be in good shape while they walk and make small talk along the walkway outlining the shape of this natural bay with calm blue water.

There are beautiful girls everywhere. The clubs are full at night but I can’t seem to get over the women walking around town and gathered around tables at various restaurants. Pacific Islander seems to be a common lineage. They don’t seem to know they are attractive and yet take no satisfaction in the attention that men seem to give in extended glances and goofy smiles that could not be faked.

Palm trees are everywhere and I crave to have the windows down everywhere we go in case I might catch the fragrance of sea air drifting inland; the scent of the unknown Pacific making its way into my nostrals and forever being burned into my memory. There’s no heating unit in the apartment where I’m staying. When the windows are open there is a breeze constantly rattling through the blinds and making a casual din. I find it amazing how little 1200 a month will fetch a person on the west coast when considering rental property.

"California is just a state of mind, its not a real place to live," I remember penning these words a few years ago when a friend’s younger sibling make the trek out west to find herself – as if the state of California held the exclusive rights to inner piece and authentic identity…the only true mecca of those shallow enough to believe that there was something special about this place. The weather is amazing, I have no arguments about that, but I think that an isolate place is the place of true soul-searching. California, then, consequently becomes a center of affirmation where people convince themselves each other they are cool enough to remain in its borders. Like so many other things, its and idea. And ideas are subject to exaggeration and can be either correct or incorrect.

So what then is California?

California is splotchy yellow paint. As a matter of fact, its hard to tell if that’s the original color or not since there is a lighter shade that seems to be peeking through where there would be rust if it had been parked in Ohio. The tires are almost bald but beautiful in that they are unnecessarily over-sized, just in case there might be call for a trip to a place where sand meets land. The roll bar is flat black and is also in need of touch up work. The seat are covered in pastel colored cloth that I recognize from the early 90’s.

There is no top in sight.

This is California.

A late 1970’s Ford Bronco that sits a permanent convertible because the owner knows it rains so little on average. Why put the top on, its useless 29 days a month. I want to take pictures of the truck almost as much as the beach I will stumble across a few hours later.

This is the West Coast. Even with its disappointments, its still what I hoped it would be.

Peace and Love

Mikey