I keep coming back to this:

I always notice after a conversation on the phone with an old high school friend who I haven’t talked to in years, things always come up that I never realized about all the changes that have been going on in my life. Mainly with the different person that I have become. It is always a little surprising to hear about how things were in the past and what people are going through in their current life to make you stop and evaluate yours. I have been out of high school going on a couple years now, which may not be long to some, but very long to me. People are getting married, talking about starting families, and finishing up grad school or getting started on it. It always makes me wonder if this was the right path and if I should be choosing a different career. My move to the Bay Area has not been as easy as I thought it would be and I seem to be trying to piece back my life together after hitting a little bump in the road along the way. With girls I think it is a little different when you’re thinking about how much older you’re getting and how you still would like to eventually plan out the rest of your future career and including a personal life. Frustration seems to get the best of me these days with all of the constant falling behind when you’re trying to stay on top of things. I suppose this is where the “life is never easy and will always throw you curve balls”, comes into play. Continuing to work full time is something I never really planned on doing when I was setting out to medical school. I also had planned to go to medical school since I was fourteen. With all the technology around me and related work I can’t help but still wonder if the tech industry which I feel so comfortable in, is the route for me. I know I’m still young and I have a lot of my life ahead of me, but to me I don’t have all the time in the world. I’m hoping a little break to sit down and figure things out will help me think about what it is that I really want my outcome to be. So I’m crossing my fingers and hoping that whatever I choose it is the right one for me.

Those of you that know me, trying new places is always on the top of my list. Especially in Los Angeles, because the county is so huge that there isn’t anything you ever have to try twice unless it is too awesome to pass up the second time around. Although now my life has turned around to get to know San Francisco as well.

I get a lot of crap for being from the Los Angeles area when I am in the Bay Area. There is apparently this “rival” between San Francisco and Los Angeles that I had never heard of until talking to some of the Bay Area inhabitants. I for one think they have just not experienced Los Angeles like I have, while I also expect myself not to understand how they feel about their city. Growing up in Los Angeles could never really be explained in words unless you happen to have lived there your whole life. The city can only speak for itself upon your own experiences. I am still to this day experiencing new things in the Los Angeles area, because there are so many things to do there. Whether it be a drive up Sunset or time spent traveling down Pacific Coast Highway to one of the many beaches I love to surf and visit. Sure LA has its bad moments which consist of the shitty smog, occasional fires, or bad traffic, but every city has its faults. It still doesn’t change how much I love the familiarity of where I grew up. The amount of culture and diversity is as vast as San Francisco’s, but I can name some of my favorite places that have so many of my own personal memories. My memories consist of nights I drove through WeHo, Sunset, or Melrose for the first time. Or when I was driving back home, looked up at the Foothills, and noticed that the snow on top of the mountains glistened clearly while you were driving up North 605 toward 210. UCLA has been a campus I haven’t even begun to experience after having attended only a year, but the Westwood area is beautiful. I could go on forever, but that would be a book in itself.

Of course I love Los Angeles, but San Francisco made me fall in love after my first trip. Driving 5, 152, and 101 for the first time up to the Bay Area was of course different than any other place I had been in Southern California. It was quite possibly the most boring drive of my life. The car pool lanes were completely different and dashed with white instead of the double solid yellow I was used to. The people were different to me and the look was almost too peaceful compared to the hustle of LA. As I drove into the city though, I knew it was where I wanted to be. The weather was crisp and cool, just the way I liked it. The architecture was completely different than LA and the access to every area by means of public transportation was completely logical and seemed easy. It was a Saturday and of course Embarcadero would be busy as fuck, but a drive to Dolores Park and then on over to the Golden Gate Bridge made it all worth it. I loved that people were jogging, biking, and seemed to generally be enjoying themselves. My flight from LAX to SFO for the first time was also beautiful. Flying up the coast with a window seat is something I could do over and over again, because seeing where ocean and land come together is breathtaking.

Here is where the problem comes in… I love both areas and I will always miss LA, but I have obviously already chose the Bay Area to go to school and will live here until further notice. Dealing with friends from both areas is sometimes a little difficult, because both like to bash the opposites of my amazing homes. The appreciation that it takes to come from both sides is obviously hard, because most of my Bay Area friends have never lived 20+ years in LA. As most of my LA friends have never lived in SF. I can safely say that I love each equally and always miss both when I go visit the other. I can also say I hate things in LA as much as I hate certain things in SF, but I have never felt at home as much as I have in both areas. The problem being that I am always at a stand still when it comes to where I want to be at that moment in time. That will probably never change, but hopefully I’ll be able to cope with being so homesick for each while I’m away.