Lifestyle is not not changing

I am loathe to say this, but my only reason for leaving LA was not simply to go to graduate school. I was and am ready for a lifestyle change. I was tired of driving through traffic, tired of being far away from the mountains, and (very) tired of seeing my wife so little because of the set up of LA. Its like we were on opposite ends of the country when I'd work in Santa Monica and we lived in Downtown. It could take 20 minutes for 2 hours to get home, depending upon god only knows what. The wind could be blowing funny and for some reason this would cause traffic.

Its not to say that I don't like LA, but I don't think I can ever move back now. Yesterday afternoon I drove 20 minutes in the middle of rush hour to go for a trail run in the mountains with my wife. Check, check, and check. Although I live in a city, everything is measured in single digit miles instead of 10, 20, or 30 miles like in LA. I think the farthest I've driven from my home in Oakland is 12 miles to get to Target. And I did it in 15 minutes. Just imagine trying to get 12 miles in LA in 15 minutes. Imagine. That was the farthest I've gone! Everything I need, Ikea, Target, food, clothing, bus, transportation, SCHOOL, is all less than 12 miles away. From my door step to the Goldman School of Public Policy, it is exactly 4.2 miles. I can take the bus OR bike in just about the same amount of time. WTF, you know? So forget about about driving short distances, cause I don't even have to drive!

Then, I was in the mountains in 20 minutes yesterday. IN THE MOUNTAINS. In a regional redwood forest. Not Griffith Park. A legitimate forest. And I did an 8 mile trail run. Traci and I were joking, but in all seriousness, I am not used to how clean the air is here. I have become slightly asthmatic to pure air. It sounds RIDICULOUS, but I swear its true. This was the second time in a week I've been to the mountains.

And most importantly, duh, I was with my wife. I have spent so much time with her recently, in part because she is looking for a job and I'm working from home. But its been spectacular. Its like I get to rediscover why we got married. And she isn't that far away. And she can't be. And I don't have to speed to or from work to get home and see her for a half hour before I pass out and do it again. We get to cook together and enjoy each other's company and explore the area that I've never had the opportunity to do before.

I hate to break it to people also, but I'm secretly a hippie at heart. Everytime I try to tell someone in my program, they look at me in disgust. Its fairly conservative, in Berkeley terms. So instead I just enjoy my trail runs, my wife, public transportation, my bike, being a vegetarian, paying cheap rent living in an up and coming neighborhood, buying organic food, growing our own vegetables, breathing fresh air, having one car, walking instead of driving, recycling, composting, volunteering, and thinking optimisticly about our future as a country. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it must be a duck!

Oh yeah, here is a 2 MB photo I took above Berkeley that just shows how gorgeous of an area I live in, I think. I sent it to my dad and here is the caption I gave him:

I took this yesterday when I went to berkeley to talk to my department to make sure I was on track. Afterwards I started driving up into the hills and found this road called panorama way, I think. At this point, where I took the picture, I had a 270 degree view of the bay area. I swear I could see the target that Traci and I went to 10 miles north of us, all the way to SF straight in front of us, our apartment, and almost to San Jose to the south. If you zoom in on the picture, in the top right corner is SF. In real life you can see alcatraz clearly and the golden gate bridge if it wasn't covered in clouds. You might be able to make note of the big antenna that you can see, also.

Anyway, I thought this was pretty cool! It’s a shame that most SF'ers don't know how beautiful their city is because they never leave it to get views like this!

Quote unquote

My wonderful wife wrote something that screams to me of everything I've ever felt and thought about life in general and sums up my philosophy that I've sought out in such a succinct fashion. I think she was joking when she wrote it, but kerouac would have been jealous. I'm paraphrasing, pulling out all of the jokes and making it "serious."

"And he ran. He ran as fast as he could, until he could run no more. He ran until his calves were burning and the sun was at the cusp of the horizon. Then he got a boost of energy and ran the rest of the way up that hill. That hill which is forbidden he conquered that hill. It was then he realized that the sun never sets, as long as you can chase it. "

To stay in the sun, you have to keep running. You can't stop chasing it. How desperate, sad, and optimistic. I feel like I'm in high school when I read this.

An impromptu protest?! Or perhaps an impromptu celebration!

A marching band of hipsters, literally white kids wearing black pants and red suspenders just marched through down the street by our house. Literally a full marching band, with cymbals, trombones, trumpets, saxomophones and like just walked by. At first I thought it had something to do with the local elementary school next door. But if that is true, then, 1., there are a lot of old looking 7th graders and 2., wow, they are cool.

I'd like to think that instead of it being a protest, it was a celebration of better things. To come. Soon. Very very very soon. Maybe before or after we attack Iran. I still can't tell. eh.

I went for a 9 mile trail run this morning in a local regional park with the local running club. On the way home through the berkeley hills, I saw this sign.

Are we a mobilized society here in the east bay?! I think so...

Montana, the state of states, places of places, beings of beings...

This past week I spent some time at work in Helena, Montana. What. a. town. While there, I visited with my friend Chris, who I haven't seen in ages. We used to run cross country in high school together and haven't lived anywhere near each other since I moved away my sophomore year of high school from Naperville, IL. It was good to catch up and go for runs.

Everyone seemed to know each other, since Helena's population is estimated at 35,000, when including eastern Helena. 25,000 if not. They have the three things I need: a good burrito place, dairy queen, and hills to run in. I ran once with chris and twice alone. I enjoy having the sense of elation that comes with the end of the trip, as if I have trudged through something difficult. Like the work is over and its time to play. Its a small slice of the first day of summer after finishing 5th grade. Its that feeling knowing you are done and there is nothing to do but play. However, instead of having a whole summer of fun, it was more of an evening of relaxation.

The last night I was there I literally ran 3.8 miles uphill and back. The mountains were about a mile away from my hotel and I just ran to them and on up. Thankfully it was a cool night because I started out in cilization on a main road, ran up a black top road, to a an old paved road, to a rock road, to a gravel road, to just a path for cars. I climbed quite high in the mountains and when chris and I measured the distance in his car, he was impressed. I ran as far as I could knowing I had to return and to the last peak I thought I could make it to. This picture is the view from the peak I made it to. Le sweet. I have a camera that takes panoramic pictures, but I had to use chris in the picture as a "post." You take 3 successive pictures, lining them up with the edge of the one before it. Chris was one post, then there was an actual post. I think it turn out well.










The other picture is of me there.

Helena, MT

I'm in Helena Montana on business right now. I really really really like the place. There is so much big sky it might kill me. In fact, it makes me a bit paranoid. I feel I can't escape from it and it just might swallow me whole. Coupled with my fear of sunburn, this can drive a person mad! I think I can't get away from it, even indoors! But the country is beautiful and the people are nice.

Semi-side note: When I die, I want my body to be a broken bag of bones. I want it to be used. I want it to be that toyotoa that has 350,000 miles and if it crashes, then it aint worth a lick and you can't get more than 200 bucks off of it. Yeah, thats what I want.

I'm in Oakland! Still running, but not counting days any longer.

An update on the move to follow soon. But I wanted to spit out this thought I've had for awhile. Still running every day, but i don't want to note it any longer. I just want to do it.

This is going to sound horrible, but i feel like no matter who we were 5 years ago, all of us have just sort of stalled out. And i thought all of us were going to have these big lives and its not to say we aren't happy, but that the excitement of the world and opportunity has been turned over to more mundane actions.

Not in a bad way, just in a way. I'm not saying that basically we've all become uninteresting

and that we used to have our whole lives ahead of us and now we're boring.

Its that what we were striving for really wasn't that hard.