TODAY'S MUSING ON LOS ANGELES
(note I realize talking about Los Angeles traffic is about as original as making cracks about California falling into the ocean, but what the hell)

Okay, so today I was driving into work. That means travelling south on the 405 through the Sepulveda pass and into West LA. You have a choice. You can take the 405 or you can drive Sepulveda. I was driving on the 405. Now I leave for work at about 6:15 am every morning so I can hit the gym before work. Usually traffic isn't as bad that early in the morning. I'll actually reach 55 mph at times. But, there was some construction after after the 405/10 interchange and suddenly traffic slowed to a crawl. Now, it's morning, beginning of rush hour that happens. The only thing is a) rush hour is not like rush hour in the rest of America. Rest of America's rush hour is normal traffic in LA. b) I forgot what b was c) well haven't even approached that yet.

When I first moved out here that drove me nuts. I could not undestand how you could be on a freeway and be driving 25 mph. I mean that simply made no sense. Freeways are suppose to move faster than surface streets. How quickly I learned in LA freeway only meant there were no traffic lights. Except for the on ramps, we have traffic lights for the on ramps to control the number of cars getting onto the freeway at any given moment. Only they're called meters in Los Angeles, but basically traffic light. First time I saw that I pretty much blew right by the red light. Point is, I got very stressed, very impatient, and very not myself over the whole affair. It was the one thing I truly hated about Los Angeles.

And I still do. The traffic sucks. No two ways about it, and the only time there's not traffic is during holidays when everyone has gotten the hell out of Dodge. Still, I find myself approaching a Zen like acceptance of the whole thing. I can't do anything to change the traffic pattern. (I use pattern loosely. There is no predictable traffic pattern in LA. You never know when it's going to be clear sailing versus stuck in a Sepulveda back up hell.) So, I find myself sitting in traffic, and managing to keep the irritation I feel down. Patience, I'm actually learning patience.

Of course, that doesn't mean I haven't memorized every short cut between here and work, but one thing you learn no matter how man short cuts you know someone else knows it too, and somewhere you'll hit traffic. Somewhere you'll get slowed down. Somewhere you'll be given another lesson in patience.

Los Angeles Of course the weather is always great in LA. Before Europeans found it, it was lightly populated by people who could cope with the desert-like conditions without resorting to civil engineering. The first Europeans to name the area, in effect, "The City of Our Lady, Queen of the Angels" were probably so bothered by the heat that they began to contemplate their own demise. A lot has been said about the creative environment LA offers. I think it is due to LA's original position, culturally, as slightly out of the loop, a place to go if you aren't consumed by ambition. Today The Left Coast is its own loop, and if you are consumed by certain ambitions, LA is the first place to go.

Los Angeles As Dream Factory ERICKSON: Well, I wrote about Los Angeles after I came back, and I'm fascinated with Los Angeles. I can't say that I love Los Angeles, and I sort of distrust anybody that says they either love or hate Los Angeles because it's like loving or hating a blank slate, and it depends what you want to write on the black slate. Los Angeles is a relatively laivable city if you know who you are and what you want to do. It imposes no civic identity of its own. It's not like New York or Paris, where you may not know who you are, but you know you are a New Yorker, or you know you are a Parisian. Here if you don't know who you are, you end up walking up and down Hollywood Boulevard talking to yourself. And that' why there are so many genuinely crazy people here, because Los Angels is this dream factory. They come here looking for Los Angels to help them define themselves, and L.A. ain't gonna do it. It's just not going to do it. So I'm back here. From a political standpoint it would be much more to my advantage to live in New York, but it's not who I am. I'm not a New Yorker, and I like the way Los Angeles cuts me loose, you know.
--Sometimes other people say it so much better.

Let me make something pefectly clear. I love Los Angeles. I'm not sure why. I haven't tried to analyze it too much. But, this crazy city that people love to thumb their noses at has more to it than shallow, image crazed, anorexic idiots. I mean that exists, too. But, that's what's so great, it all exists in Los Angeles, warmed over by the sun ready to be shaked up every now again by the earth.

Living in LA isn't it for the feint (another word I don't know how to spell) of heart. There is the smog. It's getting better, but it's still there. There is the traffic. Trust me you don't know rush hour traffic until you've driven the Sepulveda Pass. There are brush fires, earthquakes, mud slides and flooded streets. The most annoying thing, there are people who move here and don't appreciate it always complaining about how it's not like home. LA has everything, but it doesn't have Shake and Steak, White Casltes, Friendlies, coffee syrup, or some other regional favorite thing. But, it does have In and Out. Oh, sweet In and Out.

That's the first thing if anyone reading this is considering moving out here, don't expect it to be like home. It won't be. There is no other place like LA. If you like rainy, cool days, this is not the city for you. We have sunshine. Living here for awhile and 60 degrees becomes a winter cold front and not a spring thaw. We do get rain in the winter, but that's broken up by 80 degree days. About every five years we get a whopper of rain storms thanks to El Nino. But, for most of the year it's sunshine.

The thing about Los Angeles you have to understand is this, beneath the crap, the bad traffic, the earthquakes, the image conscience idiot who ruin it for the rest of us, is a gem. It's a place where its brilliance isn't put on dispaly. It protects itself behind a curtain, pull that aside and you'll find all it's treasures. It's loud and noisy sometimes, sometimes seems tacky, but look beyond it and you'll find the hiking trails in the middle of the city, beaches, Malibu, the numerous art museums, libraries, plays (ignore they're all starring people who want to be in soap operas), movies, movies, and movies.

Los Angeles has it's own particular charm. It likes to play the court jester for everyone else, but beyond the grease paint is a place worth living in, seeing, and treasuring.

Those who can't do that shut up about how much it sucks. I really don't want to hear it.