It might look like I’m celebrating the annual Food & Wine Festival at California Adventure Park, which I was. I was also celebrating a birthday, spring in general, and a few much-needed days off work. I’ve been celebrating UConn’s journey to another March Madness championship game (I picked them winning in my bracket), today’s eclipse, and a new delicious lemon recipe to make with all my tree’s lemons.

I think I heard it as a U2 album title before I heard it as a National Park, but it’s hard to avoid Joshua when you live in California. People go there. People camp there. People talk about the times they camped there. And it makes you want to go yourself. Which is why this was on my list for 2022.

I'm of course still reeling from yesterday's news of Betty White--it's safe to say it put a damper on the entire country's NYE festivities--but while on my Christmas vacation, I was quite sad to learn about the passing of Joan Didion.

Considering I've lived just a few blocks from the ocean for the past several years, it is perhaps a bit disgraceful that I've spent so little time at the beach. It's safe to say the novelty wore off relatively quickly, and equally quickly my life became full with new friends and pursuits that cut into my beach time. (I also write books. Have I mentioned that?) I can think of other reasons, too. My fair skin that burns easily, the incessant and annoying tourists that crowd this little beach town between Memorial Day and Labor Day, and, of course, COVID-19. But it's there, the ocean. And every time I see it, I have to remind myself that it's real. That I live here.

It's an interesting thing living at the beach when all the beaches are closed. Though for the best, it's part eerie and part sad to look out over the coastline and see not a single person on the beach or in the water. Of course, the headline here in California has been that the beaches have begun to reopen. Well, they opened, then closed after opening day saw crowds blatantly ignoring social distancing precautions, and now have reopened again.

After celebrating my two year mark, here’s what I’ve come up with:

If you want to know a secret, the reason I love roller coasters is because I actually hate them. Or, to put it another way, they terrify me. And yet. There's something about those final post-launch, I'm-going-to-crap-my-pants seconds that makes the whole ordeal better than if they didn't rattle me at all.

Living in California is pretty idyllic. The weather is fantastic, and I can go to the beach literally every day. I look at the tourists renting the condos along the shoreline and think, "And I get to live here." It hardly seems fair.

This was my view as I mulled over the new year and the areas on which I wanted to focus, to improve, to accomplish, or to at least spend more time on in 2016.

I had visions of Rockefeller Center dancing in my head when I heard about a tree lighting in the beach town just north of mine. Now, to be clear, I assure you I did realize there would be a difference. Like, a big one.

Things I miss about fall: changing leaves, cool temperatures, sweaters, light jackets, the smell of campfire, rainy days, and baking sweet things. I also miss all the Ohio State crap in everybody's yard. But don't tell anyone.

I've come to terms with the fact that it will never be mine, fame and copious amounts of money, and really, that's OK with me. I rather enjoy paying my bills each month, saving where I can, fighting with the bank--let's call them Schmells Schmargo--to get them to overturn $90 worth of fees I should have never been hit with (in the end they refunded only $50.50, and it still felt like a small victory).

It's like this. I live pretty close to Disneyland. As in, I could drive there, like, every weekend if I wanted to. An annual pass seems like a no-brainer, as it should be for EVERYONE who lives in SoCal, but as I've asked around since being here, I've yet to find anyone who actually has one.

Hello from the Pacific time zone. How good does that sound? No more staying up until midnight (or after) watching sporting events. I'd driven from Michigan to Utah once (and back again) many years ago, but this cross-country venture was truly that.

I've been reading a collection of essays written by female writers who have at some point lived in (and left) New York. It's amazing how conflicted we writer folk can be about this city, and in almost every essay is what I've come to dub an inevitable waffling between how we could never leave new York and the fact that we can't leave fast enough because being here is, at most, draining and shallow, and, at worst, sort of sucky.

When you live in New York, a trip to California is, well, far. Especially when you'll only be there for 32 hours. Not that I mind. Plane rides give me lots of uninterrupted reading time, not to mention the chance to wax poetic about the beauty to be seen between coastlines.

Just wanted to say that I spent last week in Florida, and believe it or not (frankly I don't think it's all that unusual although people seem to be aghast when they find out), it was the first time in my life I had ever been to Florida.