I love LA

I write so often here about my hometown, that I have failed to include much about my new adopted hometown: Los Angeles, California.
I moved here on Memorial Day weekend in 2000, just a matter of days after I received my Bachelor of Arts degree from Fort Hays State University. My brother and I had been planning the move together for quite some time, so as soon as I graduated and finished up the yearbook (I was editor), we packed our cars and headed west.
The idea of moving to LA came to me when I was working as a desk clerk at Days Inn in Hays, Kansas, during college. We had an atlas there that I would sometimes peruse while I was bored in between customers. Probably something about the nature of working in a hotel, dealing with travelers from all over the place, inspired me to pour over the maps of all the 50 states in the atlas. In addition to the mystique of Hollywood, the fact that my mom and her family lived in Los Angeles for a short time during her childhood had always interested me. In browsing the map of LA, I saw that so many places I had heard of, like West Hollywood, Burbank, Culver City, Santa Monica, and Venice Beach, were all actually just part of Los Angeles. I hadn't thought about it before, as I just assumed these were all separate cities spread out through California.
After getting my brother on board (he was just as ready to leave Kansas as I was), we told our parents. Of course, they had many reservations and were not thrilled, to say the least. Ostensibly to be helpful, but probably more in an attempt to dissuade us, mom and dad agreed to drive us out to LA in the motor home so we could test the waters, and as an added bonus we could visit my mom's old stomping grounds.
Needless to say, the rest is history. I loved the glimpse I got of LA on that trip and it only made me want to move there even more.
When Brandon and I arrived, the reality quickly sank in that we were not in Kansas anymore. If I had a dime for every time someone quoted The Wizard of Oz to me, I could have probably afforded a much nicer place to live than the small studio apartment out in the west valley that my brother and I ended up sharing.
While Los Angeles can be, and definitely was, a scary place for new arrivals like us, it also holds a certain energy and magic. It's a vibrant, multicultural city that gets a bad rap for being fake and plastic; devoid of any culture. While obviously this element exists and is very prominent, there is so much more to LA.
Originally settled by native tribes such as the Tongva, Spanish explorers eventually arrived and, in 1781, named the town El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de la Porciúncula (The Village of Our Lady, the Queen of the Angels of Porziuncola). Since then, Los Angeles has grown through many booms such as the arrival of the railroads, discovery of gold and oil, and industries such as aviation and of course, motion pictures. The city expanded outward as suburban sprawl leaked over all of Southern California.
Today, Los Angeles is the second largest city in the country. For people like me who grew up feeling repressed and restricted by the conservative ideology perpetrated in our small hometowns, the choice of where to go is often between New York City and Los Angeles. While I never really gave too much thought to NY, the many nightmares I had about it during my last couple of years in Kansas eliminated any doubt I had about moving to LA. I don't even know why I was dreaming about moving to New York, when it was Los Angeles I always wanted, but I suppose there was always the option. Don't get me wrong; having visited New York now a couple of times, I love the city... I just don't think I could live there (unless I was rich).
The things I love about LA are driving on the freeways at night when there is no traffic, walking down Hollywood Boulevard seeing the freaks mixing with the tourists, and strolling through the streets of downtown in the shadows of the skyscrapers. It's more than that, though; it's the excitement of knowing that anytime you walk out of your door, you may meet someone who changes your life, or witness something incredible. You really have to work to find the mundane here. There are new people coming here everyday, from all over the world, bringing new ideas and new energy. Here, everyone is welcome, and everyone is appreciated. There may be places called Koreatown, Little Tokyo, Little Armenia, Boystown and the like, but venture to any of these areas and you'll witness diverse crowds sharing the culture - the food, music, and way of life.
Having lived here now for eight years, I do get defensive of Los Angeles when people talk smack about it. Some people say that the public transportation sucks and that the subway doesn't go anywhere. Yeah, the subway doesn't go anywhere, if you don't count Downtown, Pasadena, Hollywood, North Hollywood, the Miracle Mile, Long Beach, the ocean, etc as "anywhere". And you can get to pretty much anywhere else in the city, outlying suburbs, and even farther, via public transportation. Just because a bus doesn't show up magically when you want it to, the system here is very efficient if you bother to take some time and plan your trip in advance using www.metro.net. Some people are just too lazy for that though.
It's those same people who usually complain about everything else, like the traffic, the smog, the homeless, the graffiti, etc. These are problems that many large cities have and are far outweighed by the opportunities for entertainment, art, theatre; sports, shopping, nature, etc. There is so much to do here it literally boggles my mind sometimes.
Some more of my favorite things: H. Salt Fish n' Chips, the Dearly Departed Tour, Hollywood Forever Cemetery (although I'm not fond of the crowded summer movie screenings), the Hollywood Bowl, Henry Fonda Theatre, Malibu, Christopher Street West (West Hollywood's Gay Pride Festival), the Giant Dollar and the "special store" inside, Amoeba Records, the gold line, the Thai food, the Mexican food, the Japanese food, Runyon Canyon, Pershing Square, the Library Bar, The Palms, FUBAR, the theatre at the Television Academy, The Arclight, and of course, West Hollywood (which I shall go into further on a future blog).
Los Angeles and Paradise, Kansas, are about polar opposites of each other but I love them both in different ways and glad to count them as my two "hometowns."