Home Sweet Home

A Brooklyn block party complete with gushing fire hydrant.

It strikes me that, if anything, we are all too typically shells of what we could be...that we wander this world almost entirely unaware of what we could be or become if given a different set of circumstances. It feels as though we've lived here for a long, long time. It's only been a few weeks really. My life back at home, seems awfully distant and almost unfamiliar from this distance. It's not that I'd like to live here. I could, but I don't think it's exactly the place for me, and it's not as though I can no longer imagine doing what it is that I do, but what this move has done is remind me that there are other things, other places. Getting out and going always does that. It's good for the head and heart.

We've been saying it for awhile, but this will be the year that we contemplate some changes. It will be our last ten or so months on the beach...both of my respective bosses will be retiring in the Spring, and then, of course, the opportunity that I have in Newport Beach, CA next summer looms large. There will be a lot of do we...or don't we happening this year and into next, so we're trying to prepare. Slipping off to New York is a good start...it rattles your senses a little.

Are you supposed to know what you want and what you're doing by the time you reach this stage of your life? I know that the most interesting people I've ever known, have not. I believe in starting over, in second chances, and in righting the ship...I do, I see it every day, but I wonder if I can do the same? Can I walk out onto the limb and try something new, something different? I don't know. The people around me have all of the confidence in the world that I can...and sometimes I feel their convictions, but at other times I wonder what's possible when you come from where I come from. Anything theoretically, but realistically, it's a much more rigid set of rules, and in the end, it all takes money. It always does.

I certainly don't have your average ambitions, and I don't go for your average fullfillment...I swear it's like I was born somewhere else, despite the shared history I have with so many people. We're all the same, and yet, my curiosities steal me so far away from the norm. I don't care if my daughte experiences anything like what I experienced as a child. I don't care to coach them or to steer them into this or into that. I only want them to be good people, and to be happy. I don't need to inhabit the familiar feelings of my life for a second time. I do need to smile, and laugh, and know that I've finally found a home. Like Jimmy Buffett said back in 1973. I think I'd have had a nice conversation with 1973 Jimmy.

Gerry and Mihoko have something special, and they feel the magic of the place that they call home. We have not...not ever. The places we feel the most kinship to are the places we typically can't go. We can visit, but we can't stay.

I guess we'll wait and see what happens. We know that we have to be smart, that we have to plan ahead and that risks need be much more than calculated these days, with Zoey in tow, and not a job or opportunity on every corner, but we know that regardless of what happens we've got each other. I could live anywhere with that.