manic mondays
Went to my first group breathwork session last night, after a bunch of self guided/follow-along with audio sessions. Sort of knew what to expect going in, but ultimately just resolved to “go with it” and “surrender” to whatever happens.
These bullshit hippie phrases. Jason says “oh boy. LA has ENTERED YOU.” And that is… fair and true and real and I’m fine with it. Vibes, or whatever. LA is a place where everyone has largely made peace with the fact that most of its expertise is completely self-claimed, made up, and ephemeral — that everyone is just throwing shit at the wall hoping something sticks. I wish the rest of the world, especially SF, would own up to it.
But yeah, so here I am. I moved from SF where I’d been listening to a whole bunch of hippie shit podcasts, and then when I settled here and realized I was living four blocks from everyone who I knew from these hippie shit podcasts. That felt like something. Started going to classes with them, and vibed. That felt like something. Was looking for something to do that was IN my body, for my body, and out of the blue options present themselves. That felt like something.
The last couple months have been about figuring out that I need to be honest with myself. With my Self. I’m making peace with the fact that my job, the day to day UX and management of it all will not, cannot, has not fulfilled me in the way that drawing and design did. It’s quietly devastating that the people I spend 40 hours a week with do not know that I have like… a rich history with art and design. Not knowing what brings me joy. That their perception of me is colored almost solely with one crayon: tech management. A factotum. How did I fuuUUuuucKKinnnGG get here? Doesn’t the rest of my life, everything before whatever I’m doing now, count for something? How do I keep that fresh?
Spent time with Brandon, my tarot teacher, talking about the year ahead, as it pertained to What I Do. Two of Wands, 9 of Swords (reversed). Always the fucking 9 of Swords when it comes to work, followed closely by the 5 of Wands. My stalker cards. I laughed out loud. Spent the last two weeks thinking about it a lot. Last night, before we got to the studio to do breathwork, Ryan, our teacher, told us the theme of the night’s session would be “Your life is your curriculum.” And… that felt like something. So yeah, spent the session in the dark just really being open with myself about what I want. What I’m supposed to be doing. What’s important.
In the past I’ve done 15 minutes or so of breathwork, last night I did 30 minutes straight, followed by 20 minutes of come down. Some big moments in there, very, very intense.
Weird moments of clarity: your fucked up teeth are fine, and you have to decide between being embarrassed and swallowing your smile or choosing to laugh, openly — both literally, and figuratively. You need to have a practice that ties you to tradition, rich inheritance, a lineage.
I felt reaffirmed over and over again that the stuff I’ve been focusing on in my off time: drawing, drawing, drawing was important, and worth while. That there is there there.
A whirl wind trip to LA. John and I fly down at 6am on Saturday morning. Before we even get to drop our bags off at his folks’ home, we have looked at two apartments. One in Los Feliz, another down near Koreatown. One is cute, but too small; the other grand, with a sketchy management firm. Both are too far from everyone we know. Who do we know? Do we know anyone? I feel fully dizzy and the polar opposite of grounded. We swing over to John’s folks’ place in Altadena, say hey to his sister who we are officially in town to celebrate — she’s just turned 30. We have light drinks, walk Hex, and then jet back down to Westlake to look at another place. Huge, incredible architecture from the early 20s, in a wreck of a neighborhood, and a potential nightmare to maintain. I cannot get over this one towering window in the entryway: two stories, multi-pane, french-door style, opening inward. All I can picturing is my climbing monstera and passion vine up and over the molding and I am in love, but I know better: there is not a square angle in the whole place.
Westlake, Pico Union, Arlington Heights. These too-precise and unknown names that seem to exist on every internet mapping service and in the mouths of precisely no one. We reference these, we get blank stares, and with comical swiftness we are in a Californians sketch again: it’s south of the 5 but not quite over to Glendale, if you’ve gone past the 101 you’ve gone too far. My eyes glaze over.
Back home we have ribs, chicken, rolls and cake for Em’s birthday. Wine. Beer. Champagne. Fresca. I fall asleep on the couch holding Hex, 10 Things I Hate About You in the background.
We have a miserable sleep in a too-soft memory foam bed in the guest bedroom, and we are up early for the first of 10 more apartment viewings the next morning. My back hurts. I’ve had too much to drink the day before, and worry it’s actually kidney pain. Maybe it is? I’m not sure. It is hot in a way I forgot days could be, and I need water. We zig zag across the city for five hours seeing place after place after place. We put good vibes out and we get them back.
We see potential. We see pitfalls. We see actual pits dug in the floor of the kitchen of one unit: “Before we go in, there are holes in the floor, they’re doing some work, they will NOT be there when you move in.” I assume we’re going to see some pilot holes drilled to fix wiring. Instead they are two 3x3x3’ enormous trenches dug in the floor down to the water main, with corresponding mountains of soil and concrete ejecta in the kitchen next to them taking up roughly 80% of the floor plan. “They will NOT be there when you move in.” As if we’d otherwise have been like “… gosh the location is nice, and a parking spot to boot… I’m just not sure about those gaping cavities in the kitchen, should we ask about that?” We meet property managers named Paizley, Jeizel, and Gwendolyn. We meet a certified so-cal hunk of a realtor with two first names as his whole name, whose pecs look like they’ve never lost a sale. We see an endless parade of kitchen arches, pedestal sinks, open floorplans, dimly-lit bedrooms, and subway tile subway tile subway tile.
We regroup at Pine and Crane. Learning my lesson from last time, I caution us both to order one thing each, as the portions are huge, and maybe a veggie to share (peashoots). We leave uncomfortably and catastrophically full. Waddling. Belching. Naturally, the next stop on our agenda is a house party overlooking a leather kink festival in Silverlake where most of the men, amply muscled and suitably bronze, are wearing nothing but singlets and harnesses. We are both struggling to suck our guts in behind generous t-shirts. This is a mess. This is wonderful. This is a wonderful mess. I’m able to rally, be sparkling for a second, and then before I know it we’re on our way back to Altadena, I’m asleep on the couch with Hex on my chest again, and then it’s time to leave. For me. John stays behind. He is officially an Angeleno again, and I am vagabond back in the bay, in a city that no longer feels like mine, but still feels like home. We’ll see each other again in nine days, hopefully with an apartment to call home, and all my stuff in boxes, ready to go.
This finally feels real.