Weather in Paradise

These cold temps just freak me out. I was born and raised in Southern California where it very rarely dipped below freezing temps (and when they did we all worried about the fruit and vegetable crops---would they survive?) Here it is skating around feeling like 0 degrees this morning. Damn cold where you get frostbite if you're exposed for a spell. But everyone says it is "Just Cold!!!" and it is the only topic of the news for today and tomorrow.

Okay, so I'll bundle up and go out when I must but it is so uncomfortable. I guess I'm just a "weather wimp." because I remember what the weather was like in paradise.

It was 82 degrees in LA yesterday.

Can't Take LA Out of the Girl

So where are you from? I mean like where did you grow up and go to school? I grew up in LA and went to school there too. Not until I left LA at the tender age of 25 did I realize how much of a LA person I was. Somehow bumping into different people that you will love, go to school with or just work besides makes one reflect about your values, perspective and overall worldview.

Growing up I thought everyone looked like they do in the movies and on TV. Boy have I been awakened. And then I realized that all the beautiful people work and live in LA. The hopefuls as well as the discovered are all photogenic. It becomes the norm. But anyway I digress...

Everywhere in LA there's a stage. Go out in public and you're an actor and on stage whether it be at the grocery store, the bank or at the red carpet of the Oscars. Everywhere is a stage because everyone wants to be seen.

Well, it isn't like that in the rest of the country. If the world is a stage, in many cases the theatre is dark. And people wear uniforms (even self-designed uniforms like LL Bean which I did for over a decade---I didn't want to think about my clothes too much in those days.)

I realized at 14 that clothes are nothing more than costumes to enhance the roles we play in life. This realization dawned on me when I was at Paramount Studios in the costume warehouse. I got a tour of the studio and I walked through the warehouse of clothes from period pieces to modern attire. It was an overwhelming sight. I've never looked at clothes the same way since.

So now I'm changing my image (again) and my wardrobe too. I don't know if Kathleen and I will be the new lesbian 50+ fashion plates. But we're having fun again with clothes. Who knows...if we're not run out of the community, we might put a new spin on lesbian fashion!

My Amelia Earhart Luggage

Amelia Earhart...What do you think of her? I think she's one of the first women to do something truly adventuresome. Heck, she did a transatlantic flight in not much more than a bi-plane. And she was truly famous. She even wrote two books about her life and her aviation adventures. And then that last flight where she mysteriously disappears. She just vanished somewhere. Now that's glamorous!!!

Little did I know that my gift of Amelia Earhart luggage from my New York grandfather had such a legacy. The one piece of luggage he sent me was bright red (won't miss that at the baggage pick-up) and had Amelia Earhart's name emblazoned on it. My dear grandfather was encouraging me to fly from LA to NYC. I was 12 years old. In two years I made the flight, and wow was it an eye-opener for my first time away from home.

NYC was nothing like LA. It snowed! Okay, it was December, but it snowed overnight. And there was so many more people and so much traffic. And everything was intense. Even the quiet museums had intense exhibits. Everything was just "One Big Wow."

LA might be mecca if you like good weather. But what I quickly learned from my NYC adventure was that the East Coast could be a feast for your soul if you were an intense type.

That Amelia Earhart luggage inspired me to do my own transcontinential flight. Thanks grandpa! Little did he know that I would move to the East Coast years later. I guess the trip made an impression.

Coming Home

Sometimes it's hard to go back home again. And then again it's hard to come home again too. My recent trip to LA left me confused about where home was. 

Once we arrived in LA, the very sunlight struck me as familar. Oh, how I remember that bright white sunlight that shone almost every day. I felt a string being plucked like my soul was a cello resonating some deep note. But then everything also had a honeyed/tannish cast about it. The colors of LA, its roads and its landscrapes, shook me up. I had painted  for years but never with a Southern Californian palette. I guess I hide away these colors for a private inspiration or maybe as a source of grief.

I left California over 25 years ago with a heavy heart. My girlfriend and I couldn't afford to live in LA and finish our degrees at UCLA. So we chose to go to the University of Oregon to finish our degrees. We both got our degrees from the University of Oregon, but we didn't get them together. We had split up.

But of course I met another wonderful woman that I would share Oregon with as well as a cross country road trip to a life in Virginia. We were together for over 8 years and then we split up. I was left alone in Virginia. I called it home for a while even though I never really ever felt "at home."

Finally I met the love of my life, Kathleen. We set up house in Maryland. I was at loose ends for a long time in Maryland. Everything felt "off" and "odd". I was still very consumed by my former life in LA. My life in LA seemed unfinished, and I always wondered what kind of person I would have become if I had stayed there.

While DC has many drawbacks, and I've never felt appreciated here professionally, I've become a better person for working in the psychological field. If I had stayed in LA, I would have gotten sucked up into the Entertainment Industry. And then gawd only knows what the condition of my soul would be.

Now I've lived as many years outside California as I did growing up in California. And while LA can still tug at my heart and soul, I like living in Silver Spring with Kathleen, Perrier and Evian. Because with them I have a home.

I've Been Zapped

Every time I return from a trip to LA, I engage in a compare and contrast essay that usually lasts for upwards to a week or so.  This is much to Kathleen's annoyance. My need to "process" these two coasts and two parts of my life and psyche can go on for hours (as my therapist knows oh so well). So I will be brief.
 
As an overweight middle-age woman living on the East Coast I don't get many men or women for that matter who look at me with a smile and sexual glint in their eyes.  Over the years I've missed these everyday and playful flirtations that were so much a part of my youth.
 
Well I got zapped a lot while I was in LA.  Getting zapped is when someone just says "hi" and flashes you with their eyes a look that says " I like you." I grew up with this kind of interaction all the time. It's great for the ego then and now too.  (And it makes you believe you're a hottie even if you're not...which is worth millions!!!)
 
Sure, I know, that those young men and woman most likely thought that I might be someone who could help advance their careers in the entertainment industry. But maybe not. Maybe we we just wanted to get zapped and flirt a little. And really, couldn't the world use a little more playful flirting?