going home

So it's been an amazing and fun week in L.A. but this girl is ready to go home! I'm leaving Monday afternoon and will be back in my very own bed on Monday night! Yaaaay!

I arrived in L.A. almost a week ago, and it's been a really full, interesting and enlightening time, I must say. I've been staying with Mom's good friend Carla in Northridge, which has been great. She's become a bit of a surrogate mom to me - even before Mom died - and has been just amazing this week. I stayed with her for a week last summer as well. This week I had the chance to hang out with her daughters, Mandy and Carmen, which was fun. They're both great girls. I'd met them as a teenager but hadn't seen them since then, so it was great to be reintroduced.

Probably the biggest highlight of my week though was my meeting Thursday with a film composer whom I composer-stalked about a year ago and with whom I've been corresponding ever since. He's given me a lot of really useful information in that time and has just been a real inspiration to me. It was great to finally meet face-to-face and talk shop for a few hours. I also played the DVD of my spring orchestration for him which was incredibly nervewracking, but he seemed to be impressed by my work and said he was amazed that this was my first orchestral composition. Pretty cool.

I drove around the Hollywood Hills one day this week, checking out some of Mom's old apartments and taking pictures. That was great. Saturday Carla and I drove up to Ventura to see Mom's dear old friend Pamela (from the Pasadena Playhouse days) and to see my beloved Pacific Ocean. Also a great day. All in all it was a great week of reconnecting with people from my past - that was sort of a theme - and I dug all of that. I'm definitely learning how important it is to keep connections of every stripe alive and well. Mom was so good at that and I want to be too.

I did a lot of growing and sorting out this week. I didn't anticipate that - couldn't have - but I'm so so grateful for it. Each little leg of this trip in fact has shown me something new about my life, my friends, my family or my future. It's all pretty amazing and I'm so so grateful that I was able to take this time for myself.

The things that were driving me away from New York in June are calling me back now and that's a beautiful thing. Yay home.

warm all week

So I'm in L.A., after spending about 4-5 days in Idyllwild. My Dad drove me to the Ontario airport this afternoon where I picked up my rental car, then drove about an hour or so to my friend Carla's house in Northridge. Carla was a longtime and very close friend of Mom's, and she's subsequently become a friend of mine. I stayed with her last summer for a week, so it feels strange to be back in this bedroom, taking serious note of all that has changed. I had so many phone calls with Mom from this house last year, and had birthday dinner with Mom's good friend Jerry. They're both gone now. Crazy.

Things are changing for Carla. She's renting her house and moving to Arkansas in a few months to take care of her Mom; landing here on her shifting life seems somehow appropriate. I feel like I have so many questions about my own life - where I should be, what I should be doing, what's really important, etc. - so it seems perfectly normal to stay at the house of someone who's trying to pack up her 20+ year history and jump out into the unknown.

So this week I'm planning on doing lots of yoga! There are a few great studios in L.A. that I want to check out. I'll also hopefully meet up with two composers I've been corresponding with, and hopefully get more insight on writing music for a living. Seeing a few old friends and some new ones, and definitely some ocean too. Should be a great week.

The weather I special-ordered has been delivered in a timely manner, so that's handy! One more week to my crazy little adventure, and then I'll begin the crazy little adventure of life back in New York!

mountain air

So I'm in Idyllwild right now. I flew from San Francisco to LAX on Wednesday, and my stepmom (still sounds funny) Melissa picked me up. We had a great day in LA - had lunch with her daughter Jen, then did some shopping and drove back to Idyllwild, which is about two and a half hours from LA. It was great to have some one on one time with Melissa. She has such a sweet spirit and I really dig her. I even told Mom at one point, "I think she's the best thing that ever happened to Dad." Gotta love Mom's response: "Oh that's so great to hear!"

It's great to be in the mountains, to really see the stars and the bright moon, breathe some clean, dry air. I love the warm during the day, cool at night thing too. It's a full moon right now - the last time it was full I was in Bali, so that's pretty trippy. I'm looking forward to my LA time next week. I have some plans lined up, but mostly I'm just freeflowing. It's crazy how my head is right now. I don't really have a schedule or deadlines or anything, so I don't freak out about being late for anything or having to wait for anything. I'm hoping I can take a litlte piece of that home with me. It's amazing how the impact of this trip is some kind of a delayed thing. I really felt the benefits of being in Asia about two weeks after I returned, and all of this time with family I'm sure will hit me in the same sort of way.

So for now I'm here. Trying to just enjoy the sounds and the smells of all the yummy nature around me. Going for a hike today and tomorrow and just hanging with Dad and Melissa. It's so nice not to have a schedule because I know soon I'll need to get one. Monday I go to LA.

portland family

Jennifer and I went to Portland this weekend for Mom's cousin Sharon's funeral. She was Mom's favorite cousin, our surrogate auntie and also our family historian. We reconnected with and met tons of extended family - second and third cousins, with lots of removals and twice-removals. It's crazy to walk into a place, look around at everyone and think, "Hmmm. Yeah. We're related."

The funeral was hard but good. They played "Softly and Tenderly" which was a hymn we had at Mom's memorial. Go figure. Then we headed to Sharon's sister Rena's house and just hung out with family. Jenn and I stayed in Sharon's house which was really neat. She had tons of old pictures on the walls, including this one of our Great-Grandma & Great Grandpa, Emma and Garrett. We went to a bar that night with a bunch of our cousins - as Jenn said, "Drinking with the kinfolk!" It was a good time. Portland is such a beautiful town too. I really felt Mom's energy there. She grew up just a few hours away. We're excited to reconnect with everyone. Sharon was sort of our link to that whole side of the family (Mom's Dad's side), so we're happy to have reestablished that connection so we can stay in contact. More pictures of our trip are here.

I'm in San Francisco for just a few more days. Jenn and I are going to have a girls' day tomorrow - shopping and lunch. Then I'll fly to LAX on Wednesday where my stepmom Melissa will pick me up and we'll drive to Idyllwild. I'll hang with Dad & Melissa for a few days in Idyllwild, then head to LA for a week before going back to New York.

Meanwhile Oona is totally walking! She takes five or six steps at a time and it's so cool to see!

brrrr august

I guess I'd forgotten what summer is like in San Francisco - it's been awhile. I'm digging to the bottom of my suitcase every day, searching for long-sleeved shirts and closed-toed shoes.

I'm really happy to be back in the States though, and especially happy to be back with my sister and her family. I seriously have the best nieces and nephews that ever walked the earth and I'm really digging having so much time with two of them. It's a life very different from my own, but I'm digging it all the same.

The Thailand Urp, as Leda and I have formally named it (she has its cousin or something), still remains, and today I went to the doctor. I've dropped a few pounds since I got back from Asia. At first that was kinda cool, but now I'm over the weight loss and ready to eat real food again, especially since I'm (hello) staying with my chef sister! I'm on antibiotics again - prescribed this time - so hopefully that'll do the trick.

Jenn's catering a wedding on Friday night, so I'm gonna work it with her as a server, then Saturday morning we will head to Portland, OR. Our Mom's favorite cousin, and our surrogate auntie, Sharon, passed away last Monday. She went in for heart surgery and just never came out. Sharon was our strongest link to all of Mom's Dad's extended family, so we're glad to go and see the people. Most of them didn't make it to Mom's memorial, so all around it'll be good to connect.

Next Wednesday I'm heading to Southern California. I'll hang with my Dad in Idyllwild for a bit, then go to LA and meet up with some friends, meet a film composer I've been emailing but have never met, and hopefully see the ocean, check some things out. I'll be back in New York the night of August 25th and I think I'll really be ready. I'm missing my peeps and my apartment and my piano.