Finding Home

She’s So California

I had never kayaked before. I had never flown before. I had never been to the Oregon coast before. I decided to do it all in one weekend. Turns out, it was all amazing.

I watched the sun come up from inside the LAX terminal, wondering what exactly I had gotten myself into. I boarded my flight and watched life as I knew it shrink down into a miniature existence and then vanish. It was all I could do but listen to the shallowed air flow steadily in and out of my lungs, concentrated and slow, mostly in effort not to panic and demand we turn back.

It is amazing how emotion can take over the human brain and memories become a total blur. Somewhere between boarding that plane and reaching my destination, I landed and re-boarded and rechecked and landed again. It was a whirlwind.

I hit the ground running in a town where geese on the runway hold up flights and I get into a stranger’s car (sorry mom). We met up with about six other strangers, loaded up our kayaks and hit the lake. It was a gorgeous day, perfect weather and calm waters winding around the hills.

As we spread out across the lake I could still hear a couple guys behind me having a conversation… about me.

“So how do you think she likes it so far?”

“I think she’s having fun… but I don’t know, she might be too much of a city girl.”
I chime in, “Hey I can hear you!”

They are a funny bunch here, I thought to myself as I smiled and drifted with the current.

It was a long flight home at the end of that weekend. Change was coming quickly and I had a decision to make. Do I stay? Do I go? Do I refuse to budge, hold tightly to what I know and risk drowning under the rapid currents of change? Do I have what it takes to embrace this moment and move forward towards something new?

As I landed back home in LAX, I felt strangely out of place, realizing that I had one foot in and one foot out. Eventually I put both feet out in front of me, picked up my packed bags and drove away.


She’s Gone Country

I remember growing up in a small central California town called Madera; only about four hours but worlds away from Los Angeles, where I would spend a great part of my life growing into adulthood.

Madera was a small town tucked into the center of California, with nothing to claim but a hot valley of immigrant field workers. We had the 4H club, the FFA (Future Farmers of America), and the annual county fair that was the pride and joy of the community. Every one of my siblings has some type of award ribbon for an art contest or a bake off or something they entered over the years in those county fairs. My fourth grade best friend had a rodeo in her back yard for her birthday one year. My favorite Christmas gift as a child was white cowgirl boots with leather fringe along the sides.

There were two elementary schools in town, one junior high school and one high school. People were born, raised and buried in that town. If anyone left, it was to college, after which they would promptly move back to town, buy a house with their new spouse and start the cycle all over again. It was down home country and that’s how we liked it.

The first sixteen years of my life are buried deep in the heart of that little town.


LA or bust

Everyone has their coming of age story; the awkward stumbling from childhood to adulthood or some twisted variation thereof. My coming of age story was written on Highway 99 as my family packed up decades of belongings and memories and drove to another world 240 miles south.

Madera and Los Angeles could not be any more different, nor could either of them want anything less to do with each other. Northern and southern California might as well be two completely separate, rival states.

Change has never been my forte, and I can’t say that I was the most excited about this one. However, the second my feet hit the sand I was in it to win it and jumped in head first. I was a sun tanning, beach bumming, SoCal girl before I knew it.
This is where my life was formed as my own. It’s where I truly found myself and found friends who became family.

My 18th and 21st birthdays were celebrated there, turning the two most important corners into adulthood, of course. I loved and I lost, then loved again. I moved out of my parent’s house. I got engaged, I got un-engaged. I went to college, I dropped out of college, I went back to college. I had a few go-rounds with a few jobs, moved around with a few friends. I lived as hard, as loud and as fast as I could.

Those were the hardest and most defining 11 years of my life, to date.


Flo-Town, This Is Our Town

“So, why did you move here again?” He asked, as if I hadn’t told him the story three times already.

“I just wanted a change. I had an opportunity to move up here, so I took it.” It really didn’t seem that complicated to understand to me.

Besides, it seems that half of California had moved here years before me. I figured this town would be used to it by now. I suppose the half of California who had moved here were all over the age of 65 though, so a 27 year old girl from SoCal kind of stands out here.

Over a year later, people still ask me that question. Today, as a matter of fact, I got the same quizzical look, followed by the same questioning as to what exactly it was that I like about this place.

Having already asked myself that question and wrestling with the answer, I just smiled and replied, “I love the small town feel. It reminds me of where I grew up; my childhood. Except that it’s on the coast, which I also love! I’ve met some amazing people here and made some pretty awesome friends. I really do love it here.”

All at once, I felt my life and my heart congruent with one another. I am genuinely happy with where I am, both geographically and figuratively, and I know exactly why. It is a contentment that I have only seen glimpses of before. It is a contentment that does not ignore the difficulties or heart ache that come with the realities of life. But it is a contentment that comes from embracing the realities of life and finding the courage to smile back.

I remember the moment I sat in the LAX airport, watching the sun come up, wondering what I had gotten myself into. And when I think back to the moment I returned to that airport, feeling slightly out of place with one foot in and one foot out, I am glad that I choose to put both feet out in front of me and make my way forward.

There is a water tower that stands high on the outskirts of town. When I first moved here, I would drive around with my friend and her son, exploring Florence along with surrounding areas along the coast (or “esploring flo-town” as he would say because he couldn’t pronounce ‘explore’ and we had nick named the town ‘flo-town’). Every time he saw that water tower, he would know we were in Florence and he would say, “This is FloTown, this is our town!”

It still makes me smile to think about the little moments like that; the ones that crept into my heart and slowly opened my eyes to what was in front of me.

Madera is where I was born.

Los Angeles will always be where I’m from.

Oregon feels like home.