In the June of 1993 my girlfriend and I finished up spring quarter, quit our jobs, and moved to New Orleans. She had family friends there with whom we stayed for about four days while finding our apartment on 2nd and Carondolet. After that we were pretty much on our own. I had difficulty getting a job and eventually lied about my experience and got a job waiting tables in the French Quarter. She got a job doing photo processing all the way down St. Charles at the Riverbend. We had no money.
But it was a great time, and great fun. A great adventure, if you will, and one of the only memorable periods of my lame-duck college years. It was my first time to live away from Washington state and it felt so foreign. More foreign than going to foreign countries now. I crave this foreignness often but you can only go away for the first time once, and after that, well, everything pales.
It was a totally irrational decision to take off for a new place with no plan and no money, but had we actutally had a goal of scrimping and saving then we never would have left. And I can say that the adventure shaped me in some way, that it made me a better person, and more worldly, and much happier than I was, and I think about this period often, and about how even the humidity seemed foreign.
A couple of weeks ago an extremely flaky old friend showed up at my door. A and his wife were moving from Seattle down to Los Angeles. He was 34 and bored utterly with Seattle where he was never able to make headway doing artistic things there. He worked mainly in hi-tech and software development but near the end I think most of their savings got eaten up around the move and the transition out of working in Seattle.
They don't have a lot of money. And they don't have jobs. And now they are here. There might be a plan, or a loose goal, or something like that, but it all seems quite off the cuff.
Insane, kind of.
But exactly what my girlfriend and I did when we were in college.
So what has happened in the last 13 years of my life to make me change my opinion about this kind of behavior? I mean, it's always been irresponsible, sure, but isn't it worth it? Surely, it's worth it. Funny enough, I was one of the loudest proponents for them moving down and even gave some kind of "you have to seize life by the balls" motivational speech...but never in a million years did I think that they would actually get it together, say goodbye, and make the physical move down to LA.
Am I turning into a pussy? Is this what "adulthood" is about? Responsibility?
The whole thing is very weird...and it's very weird too to be one of two people that this couple knows in LA. So now there is pressure to hang out and have this whole chapter of my past reopened. I don't know that there is room for him, exactly. He burned me multiple times in our history. I don't know that there is space for new friends, or new old friends, or whatever. I have my life and I am satisfied with it and now there's this whole weird new awkward component coming in and knocking on my door.
But I am more concerned about what I am becoming, which is someone who acts out of a fear of losing what he has...instead going after what he really wants, which often entails risk...
Even more disturbing is that there is a motivational book about this called "Who Stole My Cheese?" and I have read it!
If I were still 22 and met my 35-year-old self, I'd spend a few days laughing my head off. Then I'd throw up. Then I'd laugh some more.
6 comments:
This post has so many juicy levels of irony.
E of 22 vs. E of 35
E the instigator/motivator vs. E of status quo
E wishing he was less E vs. E wishing he was more E
E taking risks vs. E fearing loss
Well, E-asy come, E-asy go...
Oh, check out the other E --> Erik Erikson on why you are who you are now, as opposed to then.
Wow, A moving to LA. Weird is all I gotta say. It's difficult for me to imagine him out of the Northwest context.
The scariest part of this story is the motivational book. I could move to, say, Saudi Arabia, and that would be just a little less scary than the fact that you have, and have read, Who Stole My Cheese. God.
Also, back to your cinema posts, what about Almodovar? I'd argue for still relevant.
Haven't seen an Almodovar movie since "Kika" which was atrocious and featured a 10-minute rape scene done for laughs.
The motivational book was lying on set on a movie I did yrs ago...and I just picked it up and read it while working.
I didn't actually seek it out, see...
I think you should see Talk to Her, which is beautiful, utterly. I am looking forward to Volver. I missed the one in between, but not on purpose.
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