The Lightning Strike

French class has been depressing me - not only because I'm not very good at it, but also because the lesson plan takes concepts like "love at first sight" to teach grammar lessons like the difference between the imparfait and passé composé tenses.

In French, "love at first sight" is communicated through the colloquial phrase coup de foudre, which literally translates into "lightning strike."

When it was my turn in class to describe my experience with a coup de foudre, I had no choice but to tell the painful story of my LA guy who I was seeing before I moved here, who I first met when I spotted him across a crowded room during a visit to LA.

I had to retell the story, in French, of him suddenly disappearing, and not admitting he'd found a girlfriend until I asked him point blank.

And all my classmates pitied me, in French, for both my story and for my difficulty in recounting it.

Thankfully, that's not my only experience being electrified by the sight of another. Who knows if it's really love, but it's certainly more than lust. In coup de foudre encounters, rarely is the other person the best-looking person you've ever seen. There's just something about them - how they appear, how they act, how they enter the room - that you just love, immediately. In the story I told in French class, what attracted me most to him was his desire for me. But in the other cases I can think of - both within the last two years - what struck me most was an overwhelming desire to answer the question, "Who is that?" I didn't want to kiss them, take them to bed, or give myself freely to them. I wanted to know who they were, inside and out.

In the case of the one that got away, the one I left behind in NYC, I only got four dates with him before he dumped me and I moved to LA, before I ever got to answer that question. But he remains in the back of my mind as someone I could love, if only he would give me the chance. If only he didn't live so far away.

And now - as I've gotten better at moving on, at forgetting - lightning has struck again here in LA. I never saw him coming, but once he arrived, I could not take my eyes off of him. The night we met, I refused to leave his side. And now I find myself drinking the coffee he left behind in my apartment - now cold and bitter - just to feel close to him.

It's not love - no, not yet - but I am électrisée. I can't explain it. I don't know who he is yet. But I am finding out.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Time's Up

Three weeks ago, I gave one month's notice at my job, without having another job lined up.

After all, it took me less than three weeks to find this job after having been laid off by the one that relocated me to LA.

Wouldn't a month be long enough?

Didn't I need to stop working at this job in order to actually find some other job elsewhere? Unlike in the past, at this job, I couldn't really sneak around, surreptitiously dressing up for interviews, taking long lunches for meetings, and sending my resume out instead of replying to emails. I had to come clean, and do it out in the open. I had to make finding a new job my new full-time job.

But now I have a week left before my imminent departure.

And I cannot answer the question, "Where are you headed?" because I don't know.

I suspect I'll freelance for a bit amidst looming unemployment. I'll recapture some of the spirit of my visits to LA in the two years before moving here, when I would pay clients a visit and drive around the city all day jumping from meeting to meeting, lunches and coffees, breakfasts and confabs and pow-wows. I'll go hiking. I'll visit some of the places that are only open during the day, during the week, yet not on holidays.

I truly believe I'm meant to be in Los Angeles right now, just doing...something...else. But when I say I'd like to find out what LA has to offer me, I have to field the resulting scoffs from the jaded Angelenos who have lost their optimism, who stay in their jobs just to receive a steady paycheck.

As for me, I'm not afraid of starving to death.

But once again, I am facing the great unknown, alone out in the world. My parents aren't supporting me. I've no sugar daddies or husbands or benefactors of which to speak.

I can only do what feels right.

I might regret it.

But I most certainly would regret staying on my current path.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Out of My Comfort Zone: The Malaise of Learning Français

I have two weeks left of my eight-week French course I've been taking at the Alliance Française, something I've wanted to do for years now.

I studied French for five years between seventh grade and tenth grade and loved it. In truth, I was ready to take a language in fifth grade, having completed all of the lessons required through the end of eighth grade English, but the school system didn't have a track for a student like me (who also completed eighth grade level spelling and math before the end of fifth grade, yet not allowed by my parents to skip a grade).

While my sister embarked on her studies of Spanish because it was practical, and Italian because it was similar to Spanish, I opted for French because it was the pretty girl language equivalent of playing the flute, something else I wasn't allowed to do as an awkward child (instead being forced to lug around a giant French horn that instilled a permanent metallic smell into the inside of my nose). I dreamed of the Champs Élysées and champagne and salade niçoise. I wrote stories in French. I read stories in French, preferring those written in it (Le Petit Prince, par example) rather than their English translations. I had a French penpal. I thought in French (albeit rather simple thoughts of amour, la famille and les amis).

Five years was the maximum course available in our school system for any one language, so during my last two years of high school, I let French go. When I got to college, I never took it up again, and to this day, I cannot explain why. I suppose there were too many other studies to tackle - philosophy, psychology, embryology - that I didn't want to retread old ground. After all, I'd already studied French for five years, which at the time felt like an eternity. What else was there to do there? Why eat the same meal twice? Why jump off the same cliff when there are so many others that stand ripe for conquering?

So aside from a weekend trip to Montréal in which I was the sole French-speaker in a pack of American college students, I didn't really use it for years.

But French has never let me go. Not entirely. At my first job in the music industry, I was responsible for distributing a variety of classical music albums released by a French label in the United States, putting me on the phone and in email correspondences with Francophone colleagues (as well as those who spoke German and, oddly, Finnish). I dabbled in replying to them in French. I'd maintained my good pronunciation and some of my vocabulary, but most of all, I'd retained my love for it.

In 2008, when I was trying to strengthen the thread by which I hung (at work, and in life in general), I escaped to Morocco for a short trip, feeling drawn to the French-influenced culture but wanting an adventure a bit more dangerous and less European than France itself. Michelle was impressed with my French, but I knew I was getting by on bad grammar by looking cute, somehow convincing the locals I could be française or moroccaine, when in truth I was a-mér-i-caine. Vraiment!

Two years later, I again escaped to another former French protectorate, this time Tunisia, where my French linguistics were not as up to par since French is compulsory in their school system, and therefore the Tunisians' mastery of the language far exceeds that of the Moroccans - or mine. I could understand most of what was going on around me - reading signs and menus, eavesdropping on conversations, receiving instructions from hotel staff - but I'd lost a lot of my ability to actually communicate in the language. It was a palpable loss in my life, and one I couldn't entirely explain.

But this was a loss that I could do something about. French lessons are expensive but they're possible. And even though I shouldn't leave work at 5:30 twice a week for eight weeks, I took the placement test anyway and signed up for an Intermediate I class excitedly, with coupon in hand.

Unfortunately, I'm such a good test-taker that I fooled them into thinking I remembered anything from 1987. Upon my first class, it became very clear to me that I would be very remedial in the course, surrounded by classmates who could conjugate in various tenses, and who could conjure vocabulary on demand, both of which I could not do.

I'm not good at not being good at something.

It makes me very uncomfortable.

It has been a stressful six weeks.

But if nothing else, I am learning parts of grammar in French that I never learned before, understanding the construction of the language conceptually even if I can't execute it perfectly myself without the aid of a dictionary.

And when these eight weeks are over, I think I'd like to find a way to go back to the beginning, and start again with the Basic study of French. I know how to count to 60, but past that, I struggle. I know the alphabet. I know pronouns. And I can say them all perfectly.

I'll be the star of the class, which I'm much better at than being the dunce.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

The Need for Speed (Updated for 2023)

[Last updated 3/15/23 1:01 PM PT—Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, where I drove this stock car, hosted its final NASCAR race on its current 2-mile track in February 2023. There are plans to reopen the facility with a shorter track, perhaps a half-mile long.]

"I just came from stock car racing," I told Maria's dad on Sunday over the phone, when I'd called him to wish him a happy Father's Day.

"Oh yeah? Do you have...interest in...racing cars?" he asked, chuckling.

"Well, yeah."

Photo Essay: Graber Olive House (Updated for 2024—Closed, For Sale)

[Last updated 12/9/24 12:35 PM PT—Graber Olive House has been closed since 2023 and the website is down, with no activity on social media since June 2022. The business's Yelp listing states it's scheduled to reopen in January 2025, but the commercial property has been listed for a "quick sale" price of $3 million. The historic home is not currently for sale. It's all part of a historic district designated by the City of Ontario in 2020.]

I have had Graber Olive House on my list of places to visit ever since I first explored the Inland Empire as a month-long resident of Joshua Tree. But somehow, I never made it until today.

I didn't really realize, until today, how cool it is.

Photo Essay: The Oviatt Building's Art Deco Legacy

Most people now know The Oviatt Building as home to the restaurant Cicada, which you can find behind an ornate, Art Deco cornice on Olive Street in Downtown LA.



But the building - which isn't itself Art Deco, but rather Italian Romanesque - once housed the Alexander & Oviatt haberdashery, which catered to the Hollywood glitterati of the late 1920s. Its front entrance still features glasswork by famed glassmaker Rene Lalique.



The facade of the elevator doors in the lobby forecourt appear to be silver, but upon closer examination, they are also the work of Lalique - some of the few original design details that have survived and remain in the building in its present condition, since many of the other design elements now are reproductions installed as part of the massive restoration and renovation that the building has undergone.



The Oviatt Building is considered an art deco masterpiece, yet its art deco elements are mere accents, particularly in the building's interior which was designed in the English Jacobean style: rich, dark wood walls, doors, columns, balconies and railings, with deep red carpeting and wall coverings. Some art deco patterns are carved into that wood...



...and some colored glass still remains, but you really have to look for it.

Related Reading:
Photo Essay: Miracle Mile
Photo Essay: The Coca-Cola Ship
Furnishing an Art Deco Apartment on a Dorm Room Budget

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

All At Sea

Despite the fact that I live a short drive away from the ocean, and worked a mere two blocks from the ocean for three months when I first moved to LA, I haven't found myself very drawn to the sea.

I'm an avid swimmer, but I've chosen to make the rounds of the various area public pools at Exposition Park, in Culver City, Pasadena and West Hollywood, rather than braving the bracingly cold ocean waters whose waves resist my meager paddle.



As intimidated as I am by open waters, I always find myself inclined to ride their waves in some sort of vessel, be it kayak, canoe, motorboat, raft, ferry, or, in the case of this weekend, sailboat.



On a sailboat such as this, you can motorize just enough to get enough oomph to launch you out of the marina, expelling you from the safety of the slips.



As a civilian passenger, your life is very much in someone else's hands - those of your captain, at the helm...



...and perhaps a couple of strong-armed crew members, who may be nothing more than deck meat, but at the very least a spare set of hands, should something go wrong.



And with all of those ropes and winches, in a delicate balance of sea and air and mechanics and metal and hand, knots slipping and lines running free, something could always go wrong.



And if something does go wrong, there is no escape.



There is only the sail.



In a billowing, twisting frenzy, you either catch the air or you don't.



The boat tips sideways and you sit on the other side to balance the weight. You stay on deck because it's too nauseating down below, even for those not normally wracked by seasickness. You sustain to show your strength. You fixate your eyes on the horizon. You drink beer to distract and forget. You squint at the sun, appearing to smile.



But no matter what happens just short of shipwreck, you cannot jump overboard, not without soaking everything you brought, or leaving everything behind.

So you hope that when you fly the sail, it responds, catches the downwind without a tear; puffs off the wind, engaged, engorged, pulling away from the mast.

And if it doesn't, or when it stops - whatever happens to keep the boat from moving forward - the sail is no longer of any use, and you must retrieve it.

And find some other way to get home.

Or be lost at sea.

Related Reading:
Adventure Is Out There! Wine Country Edition
Elegy for the Flightless Bird

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Los Angeles River's Beautiful Ugly

Technically, it's still illegal to visit the Los Angeles River, a feature of Los Angeles' past and present which exists somewhere between watershed project, natural resource, real estate development, and public open space.

For years, the river's locked gates have been a beacon for homeless, gang members, and the other disenfranchised, disadvantaged, and ne'er do wells of the city.

There are stretches of it which have been turned into greenways with bike paths and river walks, but technically, it's still illegal to go there.

Thankfully, on Sunday, we had a key. And a permit.



The Los Angeles River isn't known so much as a river but as a concrete channel that cuts through the city. Because of the films and TV shows that have featured it over the years, most people know it more as a white-washed, dry ditch hidden in the nether regions of LA, home to body-dumping, skateboarding, and drag racing à la Thunder Road.



But thanks to a water reclamation project, for the first time since the river was covered in concrete as a flood control measure, there's a steady supply of water to the river, which was once fed by a number of creeks and tributaries in a time when LA was actually quite wet.



You can see the beginnings of the LA River at Owensmouth Avenue in Canoga Park (formerly called Owensmouth), where the Arroyo Calabasas meets the Bell Creek. Their concrete walls are conveniently labelled as such.



At the headwaters, the LA River lives up to almost all of its stereotypes: it's industrial, rusted, abandoned, green, and slimy. We didn't see any cadavers but there were a few healthy pigeons enjoying a bath.



A short distance away, near Balboa Park in Encino, the LA River becomes a real river at Sepulveda Basin, one of three soft bottom stretches of the waterway....



...near the Sepulveda Dam which was also built to control the floods that ravaged the Valley in the 1930s.



But whereas most of the Valley was left with a channelized, hot, dry, concrete-floored "river," Sepulveda Basin has managed to thrive as an open space with a nearby wildlife refuge.



We felt confident enough to actually get in the water with our bare feet...



...dodging mostly rocks and plants and birds...



...and the occasional gook.



The area is wild to visit because it looks quite similar to the stretches of the river that run through downtown, with the various bridge crossings and the high-banked sides...



...but this section, though not swimmable, would be fully navigable by water vessel.



And unlike Glendale Narrows, another soft-bottom section where nature has more or less taken over and the waters continue to break up the concrete floor, whose fragments simply float away, this section seems almost untouched. I wanted to spend all day there.



Instead we moved on to visit The Great Wall of Los Angeles, an extensive mural project that runs for a half mile along the concrete walls of the Tujunga Wash, a tributary of the Los Angeles River in the Valley Glen area...



...depicting the history of various ethnic minorities in California from prehistoric times to the 1950s, as well as other pop cultural and social milestone events like the Baby Boom and the birth of Rock and Roll.



The mural, like much of the LA River, lies behind a fence.



In fact, for the last 60+ years, it seems that all people have done is try to hide the LA River - limiting its access, obscuring the view of it with hedges...



...and turning their houses and buildings away from it.



At least now, when you're driving through downtown, or Studio City, or Burbank, you get to see those blue and white signs identifying the river, so you have some sense of its crossings...



But it's impossible to follow the river from beginning to end, or along any long stretches - by foot, bike, or car (or boat). It's a stop-and-start waterway that sometimes sends you walking in circles, the path dead-ending at, for example, CBS Studios, which is not letting in recreational visitors anytime soon.

For those of us obsessed with uncovering the hidden treasures of LA, exploring their beauty where others only find ugliness, the LA River has tremendous draw.

But those who have dreams for the river wish to remove the concrete and restore it back to its natural state.

Even upon my second day-long visit, I don't want to change it. I just want to get to it.

Related Reading:
Los Angeles River's Ugly Beauty

For more photos, click here.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Photo Essay: Abandoning the Trail to Bailey Canyon's Cabin Ruins

The number one draw to Bailey Canyon for me was the opportunity to take a relatively short hike to the ruins of a historic cabin, 2.2 miles up from the trailhead.



Called the "Old Foundation," it wasn't quite as far as Jones Peak, which would have required a relatively grueling hike to reach, in the peak of the afternoon sun.



After all, I'd already hiked part of Fish Creek that morning.



It seemed like it was going to be a relatively easy hike, until I reached the bridge at the juncture of the Live Oak Nature Trail (across the bridge) and the Canyon View Nature Trail. Neither one was the Bailey Canyon main trail, which we planned to take to the cabin, and my hiking guide book instructed us to cross the bridge to get there.



After crossing the bridge, we walked in circles for a while, hitting dead end after dead end, returning to the bridge a few times saying, "I know we're supposed to be here." My friend suggested a couple of times that we go up the trail before crossing the bridge, but I kept saying, "No, that goes to the waterfall, and we're not going to the waterfall."



But it turns out, that's exactly where we had to go. A short distance up that trail, we hit another juncture: the Canyon View Nature Trail to the waterfall, and the Bailey Canyon Trail to the Old Foundation.



We embarked on a steady climb upwards, hot and dusty in the late afternoon sun, trying to temper our overheating by drinking plenty of water and taking plenty of breaks in the shade.



But the trail - which I thought would be easy - proved to be too daunting for us, and although we just kept climbing and climbing (with me even leaving my friend behind to continue forging the hike)...



...we both ended up quitting at one point or another, before reaching the Old Foundation, whose exact coordinates are still very much of a mystery to us.



After all, who would've built a cabin that high up? How would they have ever gotten there? Where could it possibly be?



Normally, by myself, I would've tortured myself and kept going just to find the damn thing, but on that day, I had to remind myself that these hikes are not always about reaching some certain destination. Sometimes they are simply about climbing a mountain and turning around to see what's below.

And on a day when I wanted a relatively easy hike to a gratifying destination, I had to be satisfied with as far as I got, and then abandoning the trail and turning around to go back.



After all, Bailey Canyon will still be there. I can always go back.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Some Things Aren't Better Left Unsaid

Sometimes

You don't know whether your decision about something
is right
until you say it aloud.

And then when you start to finally speak your mind,

people finish your sentence for you,
anticipating what you're about to say,
and agreeing with you,
wondering what took you so long to utter the words.

Whether it's
"I love you"
or
"Hairspray makes my hair get dirty faster"
or
"I quit,"

the vindication doesn't come
until the thought is actualized
verbalized
and acknowledged by those who have prognositicated the same exact thing.

I gave notice at my job last week,
and the curious thing is,
no one seemed all that surprised.

But although it was clear
to everyone
that I must move on,
what is in the vast unknown
to everyone
is what lies next
for me.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.