I’ve been away for some time. My experience in Chicago was exceptional. Louisville was shockingly smaller than I remembered leavening it. California is beautiful every day, even though Californians have been apologetic about the June Gloom, which stuck around until August. I’ve debated posting lately, because as solid and strong as I start off, I pretty much just end up writing half-assed rants about, well, nothing.
It’s not as if I don’t have plenty to write about, I’m just a lazy fuck sometimes.
Los Angeles is a wonderful city. I was talking to my dad the other day and he asked what was my impression of the place. I told him jokingly that, “the palm trees and weather are nice, but L.A. is full of fake tits and real assholes.” I don’t really mean it. At least the ‘assholes’ bit. But the inhabitants do have a funny way of making you really grasp the concept of being an outsider. Maybe it’s something I imagined, but walking the boardwalk in Venice, with the looks I felt I was getting, I may as well have been wearing jorts, tube socks, Teva’s, and a fuckin’ fannypack screaming “I’M NOT FROM HERE” over a loudspeaker.
Locals everywhere hate tourists. Luckily for me, there aren’t any tourists in Kentucky, and if there are, they should seriously reevaluate how they spend their vacations. At school in Chicago, tourists stick out like an overweight child in a public pool - except they usually aren’t wearing swim-shirts. The easiest to identify are international tourists. Packs of Asian visitors tend to dwell along Michigan Avenue, and I really don’t mean to sound ignorant or bigoted, but just take a look next time you’re there. They take pictures of the weirdest shit.
I’m not lying to you.
I don’t have an ear for oriental languages, but I can imagine they are saying things like: “look over there, honey, that man is digging in the trashcan!”, “wow these pigeons are truly majestic creatures”, “get out – aw come on no way. A fire hydrant?!”
For me, there’s no worse feeling than being an obvious visitor. My parents are from Ireland, and I’ve had the luxury of visiting my family over there a good times. To my cousins, my siblings and I are simply “the Yanks”. There’s a certain novelty about being American in Ireland, probably much to do with the history of Irish culture here in the States. But you can have an Irish name, Irish parents, an excellent understanding contemporary and historical Irish culture, the stomach to pound Guinness, and the balls to pound Jameson, but to them, you’re still a Yank.
I’ve learned that you kind of have to own being an American, and just do your best not to be “the ugly American”.
Back to America -- California drivers have no lane discipline. The carpool lane and the far right lane have consistent drivers: on the far lef:, speeding soccer moms and vans full of teenagers, on the far right: high drivers. People stoned out of their mind, going 25 under. Everywhere else is a warzone. Drivers in Chicago love their horns; drivers in Kentucky would stop traffic for miles to let somebody make a left turn. Drivers here are completely unpredictable.
Wherever you are this fine summer, jam out to this and have a great day:
