One year in LA

So many boxes

I also had a lot of time to think. Too many people asked “any second thoughts?” during the long months I had to wait for my Brooklyn lease to end. In reality, my thoughts and feelings at the time were so overwhelmingly positive that I found I had to stop and make myself think of potential bad outcomes. When I’m ready to go, I GO. No tears, no angst, no second-guessing. I think I just know myself really well at this point.

With my last big move, from DC back to NYC in 2011, my feelings were similar. My time living in DC was hard, frankly. I lived there for ten years but it rarely felt like home. That decade was a time of amazing career growth, but also deep sadness. I hadn’t wanted to leave NYC and when I did so out of necessity (for a job), it was immediately after September 11. I felt like a traitor, leaving the great city when she was down. I made good friends in DC, but DC’s transience meant sometimes I had a gaggle of good friends and other times, just a handful, few of whom knew each other. I withdrew into myself and didn’t make the most of my time in DC. That’s on me. (at least I ate a lot at José Andrés restaurants)

While preparing for LA, I could only think of two outcomes that would suck. The first scenario was obvious: having my mother need me and not being able to get home to Pennsylvania as quickly as I could from NYC. The second was this: what if I got to LA and no one cared? 😆 And by “no one” I mean the friends who always said “you should move here.” What if I made the move and found out I didn’t actually have friends here? What if I spent my first night as an LA resident and felt lonely?

Spoiler alert: it didn’t happen.

Other than the pandemic, my first year in Los Angeles has been magical. I haven’t had a second of regret. I can walk to the beach – and I do! I have so much joy that it is probably annoying to some of my friends but I don’t care. Maybe my happiness will mellow in year two, but I think that’s unlikely.