A lot of things are almost done.

I am leaving Los Angeles soon, and I am glad.

Not leaving for good, of course. As of a few weeks ago, I am officially on the lease for this apartment, which is a nice place with a balcony and in a neighborhood where I would easily expect to pay about $300 per month more than I do now in rent money. My landlord is sort of a flake and I will probably never have air conditioning, but those are small(ish) offenses. The living room has soft white paper lamps in various shapes and paintings, done by a friend of mine or by my roommate. Maybe I will make something to put on the walls as well. I am comfortable here.

But, oh, this summer, and oh, Los Angeles. It has been so long, and so all the same. A hundred hours logged sitting on the bus, or more. Another hundred plus logged sitting in class, discovering that I couldn't learn with my mind turned off. A lot of missed deadlines, piling up. The same meals. That mozarella sandwich on campus that cost $6 and nearly had me vomiting on the sunny pavement. And always, everyone I know being so far apart.

I miss the insularity of the 'Center', which kept us all involved in each other's lives, even though it was also often dreary and bleak. I think I miss everything as soon as it stops happening, until the next thing comes and washes it out. This analogy is certainly applicable to my dating life, when I have one. I never know if I appear complicated or simple when I first meet 'the other'. I don't know which description of myself would be more appropriate, either. Certainly my emotions are simple; the way my mind works is not.

So, I will give up these dry hot times and go to Florida, for the rain and my family. I will definitely eat chocolate-covered dried cherries, annoy my cat, and float in the pool. I will almost certainly get a sunburn. I will not drink my parents' beer, because it is cheap and terrible, and if I start drinking at home I'll see the next sister soon following suit; what sort of example would that make me? When all three of us are home, we all revert to a dynamic that was set in place as soon as there were three of us at all. I think I get stuck at about 15; the two of them at 10 and 7 seems about right. They fight in the car and threaten to spit in each other's hair. Later, we will all climb into the same bed with the cats, say nothing for awhile, spread our bodies out at weird angles. It is always much more comforting to do this with the girls than when my mother comes in to hug me in the morning. I have never been able to feel her hold onto me without feeling that I'm suffocating. It's a neat emotional analogy, as well, but of course a very real physical reaction too.

After that, I will go to New York, and spend my days sitting in cafes in Brooklyn with my beat-up darling laptop. The nights will hopefully all be spent drinking. Sobriety and friendlessness are not doing me any favors, and I have to have some kind of summer vacation, even if it happens in September. If my dating life keeps being idiotic, maybe making eyes at drunk Brooklynites will calm me. Maybe I'll get high for the first time in a year and make fun of people one of my best friends and I both dislike, which is the best schaudenfreude-y time I can have. One day I will go back to my high school reunion, or someone else will, to find that all the people I never liked are now fat. Thanks for the genes, mom, if not the hugs -- at least I don't have obesity waiting in the wings for me. I get enough curveballs as it is.