Leaving LA

Two years ago, when I was moving to Los Angeles I made the announcement for casual friends and acquaintances on Facebook simply with a link to a Led Zeppelin song.

Made up my mind to make a new start
Going To California with an aching in my heart.

Perhaps a little too on-the-nose, I was leaving New York looking not for a new start but to add balance to my life in a way that I figured Southern California was uniquely qualified to help my find. I had never stepped foot west of Texas, but had a strong draw to a city far different than Philly, NYC, or Chicago.

People warned me I wouldn’t like LA compared to the east coast. Claims ranged from “you’ll grow tired of the fake people,” to “you’ll have to get a car to survive.” In reality, neither of those things, or the many others that people said came true.

I almost bailed before I really came to know the city. A job opportunity in Tokyo came within an hour of reality but ultimately I chose to stay and explore what had started off really great. 

Meeting strangers is tough after college, no matter where you live. In my mid-20’s I worked with 300+ people roughly the same age and within an easy subway ride around the five boroughs. In LA, in my late 20’s it was a little different. The new west-coast office of my New York agency was only 15 people, none of whom I worked with directly. When I changed jobs, the new agency had a larger LA workforce and more people who I connected with, but the after-work culture was different than I was used to. Perhaps it was the lack of good bars/restaurants in the area coupled with long commutes, but people just didn’t go out in the same way they did in my other cities.

So I made friends elsewhere. Eagles bars introduced me to a lot of Philly transplants. I slowly learned that there were a bunch of Drexel acquaintances out here. My friend group skewed a bit more toward east-coast expats, but we all had a similar mindset in choosing to set up out west. Bumble dates became a fairly regular occurrence with a occasional breaks as organic relationships came around.

Aided by the SoCal sun, biking 13 miles down the coast to work and back became the norm. It added to the miles of morning runs to help me build endurance without killing my knees while I trained to complete one of my goals: running a marathon. Once I knocked that race off my list I joined the gym a minute down the street from my house. 4:55am alarms weren’t that bad knowing I was working out by 5:00 to get in the best shape of my life.

When an unusually wet January/February arrived, I learned the mass transit route for my commute. And while all that water helped relieve drought conditions, it brought another uniquely Californian problem. Using the the fresh ground growth as fuel, multiple wild fires popped up around the region. Ash from fires in Bel Air reached Venice. You could see the smoke from my office further south in El Segundo. Friends and family checked-in to make sure I was safe. In reality, only a few of my friends were even remotely affected but for strangers, efforts arose to find housing and fill other needs for those displaced.

But now I’m leaving LA. I’ll share more on what’s next later, but for now, just a sincere “thank you” to this city and everyone who makes it the unique place that it is. And while this post shares it’s name with a lengthy Father John Misty song that’s been bouncing around in my head, I’m not leaving with nearly the same level of cynicism with which he sings

“These L.A. phonies and their bullshit bands
That sound like dollar signs and Amy Grant”

Maybe coming to LA with different goals than budding actors, models, and musicians is the key to happiness here. Maybe I was just lucky. But mostly I’m grateful I was able to spend more than two years here. At some point down the road, I’d love to come back and when I do, I’ll probably do some things differently. But for now, it’s on to a new adventure.