This is an update in general of my
pervasive and sad but curious thoughts on the world. After the long local confinement that’s been
my life for the past almost two years, we finally took a road trip. The truth is, we’ve been terrified of our
daughter to the point of not wanting to wander out any further than the city
limits of our sleepy big town that is San Diego. The fear has been that she’d crucify us with
her undying contempt and disapproval by means of shouting and crying. Be that as it may, we felt that we were
finally at a place where we could handle a small trip to LA.
Our beloved love child was great
during the trip, so there was definitely no issue there. And while it was awesome to get out of the
city, it was even better to get up to LA.
Anyone who’s read either of my books will know that both stories were
set in LA. There’s good reason for
that. LA is an amazingly vibrant,
exciting, and powerful city with a huge culture and mix of interesting people of
worldly elite. I love LA. And, as I’m writing this, I’m reminded of the
attitude that San Dieogoans have towards LA, in general, but I will address
that piece separately.
While we were hanging out with my
cousins at a park, my babygirl was playing in the playground. My wife and I watched proudly as she
maneuvered through the play structure when a few of her peers wandered on to
the sand. I said to my wife, “here is
the real test. The LA kids don’t mess
around, they will test her.” My wife
smiled nervously, and while she generally knew what I meant, I of course went
on to explain.
I have spent a lot of time in LA,
growing up here in San Diego. Most of my
family lives there, so I spent a lot of time as a youth there. Plus, it’s only a two hour drive, and if
you’ve ever seen the traffic on the 5 freeway between LA and San Diego, you
know that it is as heavy as it gets. But,
even though the city is so close, it is so far, and also so much faster than
San Diego. You grow up fast in LA. The fit are simply more fit and the weak do
not last long. I know it’s the same in
most big cities, but through my experiences I know that San Diego is a lot
further behind in that sense.
When I was a kid, I’d get to LA and
the kids my age were doing things that the older kids were doing. They were smarter, had quicker wits, knew all
the cool shit out there, dressed cooler, talked cooler and even listened to
cooler music. And I know that everyone
pretty much learns the same things over time, but they just learned them faster
in LA. And everything is magnified more
too. Flaws are magnified and exploited
and virtues are magnified and reveled at too.
You gotta have tough skin and you can’t be afraid of the spotlight. In San Diego, you can get away with being a
weirdo; well maybe just being a bit off, but in LA the kids will call you out
on that shit. You might be the coolest
in your school in San Diego, but when you get to LA, you aren’t so
special.
Another thing I just thought of is
food. In a big city you can keep the
night going, but that’s pretty hard to do in San Diego. Even when I lived in Toronto, I could get
chinese food or pizza at three in the morning.
You think I can get anything like that here? Hells no.
I gotta hit up Walmart for some frozen pizza if we get a late craving. We did that at least once too, on the way
back from the one short strip of clubs that makes up San Diego’s club
scene. Don’t get me started on that
either, because once you start going to the clubs here on the regular you just
run into the same old people over and over.
The club scene in Toronto was off the chain, and the music was way way better. Listening to San Diego radio stations has driven me to talk radio. Can you say, put on top 40 and hit the repeat button?
That’s the gist of it anyways, and
that’s part of the allure of big dynamic cities over the sleepy, slow life of
smalltown, USA. It’s way bigger than
that, of course, and to really cut to the core of it as Baxter would, you’d
have to dig a lot deeper into it. It
would require more analysis, including psychological and sociological impacts,
economic and environmental impacts, industries, politics, race and culture
demographics, climate, geographic topology, equatorial relationships, and so on
and so forth. Alas, I try to keep my
puff pieces light. Let’s just say that
life in the big cities and fast and exciting, whereas life in the small cities
and towns is a lot slower and mellow.
Which one is better is not the point.
At any point in one’s life, one or the other might be the best medicine.
Oh yeah, and I guess I never got to
the hot girls farting part of this piece.
I guess I’m saving that for next time.
For now, just try to imagine.
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