TEXAS: THE NEXT JOURNEY

Every life involves choices. During your youth, decisions that are made during key moments (Like your choice of a college major, your choice of friends, your choice of romantic partners, whether to experiment with heroin or not, etc.) can often be more life changing than most people realize. Sometimes, these decisions change your life, permanently alter it, or prematurely end it. Bad choices can often lead to moments of regret. “Would my relationship had been better with “X” woman if I had not been such an immature idiot while we were dating?” “Why am I a Los Angeles Rams fan and not a San Francisco 49ers fan?” “If I had chosen this major instead, what would my professional career had been like?” This is why the idea of multiverses or multiple dimensions discussed in theoretical physics is a fascinating subject. What “if” I had made this choice instead? How would my life have turned out? These questions are asked because all of us (The Buddhist reincarnation theory notwithstanding) get only one biological life to enjoy. And once that body has had enough, the journey comes to an end. There is no rewind or pause button on your life. Time moves only in one direction. And everything always comes to an end.

At this moment, my life can be divided into five distinct sections. The fifth section is currently beginning with my relocation to Texas. But the previous four are in the history books and can be re-evaluated with perspective and a small dose of wisdom. My childhood was from 1974 to 1992 primarily in the South Bay, a suburban area about twenty miles south of downtown Los Angeles. Living primarily in Torrance and a wonderful six plus years next to the ocean in Redondo Beach, there was nothing particularly traumatizing about my childhood. My parents did their best. Both were flawed like any human born onto this planet. We had massive financial issues mainly because the world of the 1950s/1960s that my parents were accustomed to was coming to an end. A new financialized culture was developing in California that neither of my parents were prepared for. Besides this, the voices of wisdom (My grandparents) were dead before I turned 19 (My Dad’s parents were old when I was born and they died in 1980 at 83 years old and 1981 at 75). My Mom’s parents died younger. Her father was in World War II and went into Japan not too long after the nuclear bomb was dropped. He battled cancer in his 60s and it eventually killed him in 1987 at 66. My Mom’s grandmother lived the longest into my life until 1993 dying at 69 years old. My grandmother suffered from what is now called bipolar disorder and the biggest disruption in my childhood was watching my family members deal with this.

The second section of my life involves college and the birth of my daughter. In 1995, I left the South Bay for the first time and settled in Orange County until 2003. I graduated from college and started my career in the television industry. These years were filled with college level courses, lots of dates, lots of concerts, and financial struggles after the birth of my child in 1998. Still being in my 20s, the ups and downs of this era were extremely difficult. Every time it felt like we were financially breaking through, something would happen like September 11, 2001, where my partner and I both lost our jobs forcing us to start over…yet again. This era is when the innocence of childhood and the fun of the high school and college years needed to be put aside. One thing that I do not regret about this timeframe was all the wonderful culture I got to experience. Nothing has been the same in California since the 90s era ended. This was the realization that was needed to put aside the FUN and begin to focus on the needs of the family.

This brings me to the third section of my life which I will call the DESERT ERA (2003-2012). I want to begin with a comparison. As it is too early to compare my one month in Texas with my almost eight years in Arizona and forty-one years in California, there are a few things I would like to discuss about the differences between these states.

CALIFORNIA: The two different eras I lived in this state could not have been more different from each other. But in summary, there are a few things that can not be beat about California (The incredible diversity mainly involving food and culture, the never-ending amount of things to do from bodysurfing in Malibu to attending Lollapalooza at Irvine Meadows, seeing the Rams play at SoFi, and everything else in between including the diverse amount of alcohol options, the interesting and more educated people that are always fascinating to chat with, the almost perfect seasonal weather, and the opportunities during my childhood). During my childhood, there were a lot more positive things about California than negative (For instance, the never-ending traffic, the terrible gang violence and drug problems, and the large sections of the city drenched in poverty and homelessness). During what will be discussed as the fourth section of my life (Below), my return to California was not nearly as joyous as the childhood era. The negatives of the state (The politics, the cost of living, the intolerant and incredibly self-centered people) had overwhelmed the positives mentioned above. But no matter how my feelings have evolved about my birth state, it will always hold a special place in my heart. Living in that state made me the individual I am. I take a massive amount of pride in that.

ARIZONA: The third section of my life, the DESERT ERA, took place mostly in the suburbs of Western Phoenix. There was a short 20-month section in Palm Desert, California before the permanent move to Arizona in December of 2004. This era was marked with financial risk (That backfired), the growth and maturity of my daughter, the birth of another child, the ending of one career while another was birthed. Unfortunately, due to a massive real estate crash and financial meltdown, we got nothing out of our first home and eventually left Arizona with just 20,000 dollars in the 401k. But Arizona had its benefits. My partner was finally able to finish her education and got a BS degree at Arizona State as an electrical engineer. My daughter matured into a wonderful little person and graduated from 8th Grade in 2012. In fact, if evaluating the DESERT ERA and removing the financial losses, our family moved forward mentally and psychologically and became a stronger and more determined unit with more wisdom. We experienced six years of home ownership. On a personal level, I made a few good friends at my job that are still part of my life today. And the overall experience of the Phoenix years can be seen as positive. By the time we left in 2012, both my parents, sister and her children were in the Phoenix area. My father later died in Arizona in 2019. Arizona does have a few advantages over California (Wonderful freeway system with less traffic, a large amount of sporting events that were cheap and easy to attend, some very interesting landscapes and ghost towns, a better respect for individual rights, lesser laws) but also was loaded with a ton of negatives which eventually led my partner to want to leave (The oppressive heat, the unfriendliest people, the shockingly high crime rate where we lived, the terrible medical system, and eventually, the collapse of the job market in the late 2000s). The education system in Arizona was also abysmal. If I had to compare the circumstances of living in California to living in Arizona, I still think the Golden State on the Pacific Ocean is a better experience.

This leads to the fourth section of my life, THE RETURN (2012-2025). With my partner’s new degree, we returned to California as a family. My son was one year old at the time. My daughter graduated from high school and college upon this return. My son grew up in San Diego and Murrieta, CA and created his own friend base there. Financially, our return was beneficial. We became homeowners again and made a nice profit on our home after selling it four years later. But after being forced to end my television career so my partner could pursue her dreams, my professional career has been an endless struggle moving from one different industry to another and trying to stay ahead of the rapidly changing job market. What happened in California has happened to millions of others who love the state but had to leave it behind. During COVID, the insanity of California politicians was on full display and Constitutional Rights quickly took a back seat to the “protection” and “safety” of the people. During the Biden years, inflation got so bad, that my wife and I making close to 200,000 a year were struggling to save any money. Living in California since 2020 stopped being fun. Our son’s education got so bad that I pulled him out of public school and have been homeschooling him since 2021. Despite my partner and I having most of our friends living nearby, it was no longer possible to sustain our lives in a state that was becoming unaffordable just for daily living expenses. The hope of buying a retirement home died during the massive increase in home prices that occurred during COVID. California was good for us financially. But it was not good for us physically or mentally. It was time to make the change into the now current fifth section of our lives.
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This brings us to Section five, Texas (2025 - ?). During THE RETURN, my family decided to live outside of a suburban area for the first time. Every suburb we had lived in was part of a greater city that numbered millions of inhabitants (Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix). And though we are technically considered part of the Greater Houston area also filled with millions of people, we are far enough removed from the city to enjoy many aspects of rural life. We experimented with this in Murrieta, California being at least an hour away from San Diego and Los Angeles inside an exurban community that had its own identity. Our current home in Willis, Texas reflects the same circumstance. The key difference is that our land will be better for growing a garden and raising chickens, we have a clean and massive lake nearby, and the area is wetter due to the increased humidity. Murrieta was dry, had one of the most polluted lakes in the country nearby, and the area was known for its incredibly wineries. We will see what happens. But whatever comes out of this experience, let’s hope the family is happier and wiser. Onward with life!