{"id":132,"date":"2002-12-11T19:24:29","date_gmt":"2002-12-12T02:24:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/?p=132"},"modified":"2012-05-02T13:41:30","modified_gmt":"2012-05-02T20:41:30","slug":"stranger-in-my-old-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/2002\/12\/stranger-in-my-old-city\/","title":{"rendered":"STRANGER IN MY OLD CITY"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here I am, in a beautiful hotel in my former neighborhood. It was so strange, to leave from an airport that I have never seen before and arrive in an airport that is so incredibly familiar.<\/p>\n

Taking trips, plane trips, were so out of the question when I was small. I had been on a plane once, when I was five. But the rest of the time, planes were as far away as the moon. No money, no open door, no flight path.<\/p>\n

So, when I got older, flights were very possible. I am nervous in airports, but I LOVE to fly.<\/p>\n

And I was excited to leave from Burbank, to find out what this new airport was. It is kind of disappointing. San Francisco airport, the one that I know, that I have memories and stories in, is much nicer.<\/p>\n

And here I am, in the shadow of the Transamerica pyramid, in this beautiful, amazing, creative, energetic, sexy city that I love so much.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not MY city anymore. I\u2019ve never lived here. But I lived for seven years in the San Francisco Bay Area…The Bay Area\u2026That means that San Francisco is mine.<\/p>\n

Well, the first few years were full of unhappy memories. But the last few years were the best in my life.<\/p>\n

It is hard to think that I am not part of here anymore. Here is very much a part of me.<\/p>\n

I live in Los Angeles now. And I really do live in Los Angeles\u2026I live and work right in the middle of the city of Los Angeles. I am part of the city.<\/p>\n

But this city is not really part of me. I don\u2019t have so many stories here. I am still trying to grok this huge sprawling city. I am bewildered and intimidated by the highways and the styles. I am trying to understand what I should be afraid of; who I should be afraid of.<\/p>\n

Everyone says there are things to be afraid of here. \u201cHaven\u2019t you HEARD of Compton? Don\u2019t you know about Watts? And East L.A.?\u201d<\/p>\n

I think it\u2019s sad that I have to learn to fear like that. But I do know that I, one person, cannot change decades of segregation by ignoring it. I have to be smart.<\/p>\n

It takes a while to get used to a new place. I\u2019ve moved enough to remember that. I have more experience, and I know that.<\/p>\n

LA seems like it has a lot to offer. I have more to offer too.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m glad to be out of the bay area. There were too many bruises on the map, even though I had shining moments and places.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m happy to be in a place that I can make my own, now that I have more of my own to make with. It just feels empty until then.<\/p>\n

I guess I\u2019ve moved from a place I\u2019ve grown out of into a place I haven\u2019t grown into yet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here I am, in a beautiful hotel in my former neighborhood. It was so strange, to leave from an airport that I have never seen before and arrive in an airport that is so incredibly familiar. Taking trips, plane trips, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bookworthy","category-my-day-job"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/writtenbymurphy.com\/wonderblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}