Los Angeles, I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down

Shortly before graduating and leaving Arizona in 2006, someone close to my heart told me she felt like she was "losing me to L.A." (This somehow remains one of the most touching things anyone's ever said to me, and I ended up writing 'Oceanside' for her shortly after. It's arguably one of my favorite poems--pieces, possibly--I've ever written.) Nonetheless, sometimes, I feel I've lost myself to this place. I love it to death--it's my home, my youth, my likely future; yet in time, it beats me into the ground and I'm overcome with the need to escape it.

As of now, if things were to go as planned this summer (but do they ever?), I could be spending time as far west as I've been from home (Hawaii) [EDIT, 6/30/08--NOT HAPPENING--flights: too fucking expensive], as far north (Alaska) [EDIT, 6/30/08--NOT HAPPENING--too fucking expensive, work frowns upon taking off for two weeks in between two 2-week hiatuses, apparently], and as far east (Israel). (Not to mention the possibility of briefly visiting some destinations in Europe and/or Asia Minor after Birthright in Israel.) [EDIT, 6/30/08--EGYPT!!--I'll need to get back to work, but not without a couple extra days off.] Perhaps I should look into Argentina or New Zealand and take care of the south. [EDIT, 6/30/08--Let's not rule this out; there's a lotta year left, and if I've learned anything thus far in 2008, it's that I'm acting more and more impulsively with less and less regard for this little thing called "finances."]

I've never been so eager to get to know my camera better.