The End of the Road in California

     I once made the drive across country -- it was in 2004 when I brought my daughter's car out to San Francisco where she was going to college. I left home in New York and first headed south to Jacksonville, FL, to visit my sister. Then I got on I10 and took it all the way west, stopping for a few days in Phoenix to see my other sister.

     I continued on I10, 2500 miles in all, until I arrived at the Pacific Coast Highway in Santa Monica. And as I looked out over the Pacific Ocean, I realized I was truly at the end of the road.

I didn't see Brad Pitt

     Now on my current trip I'm staying in a townhouse/condo type place, just a half a block up from the Pacific Ocean. And once again I am really aware that I've come as far as I can go, without getting wet. It's fun to walk down to the beach at sunset, along with a scattering of other tourists and locals, and watch the sun go down over the water, knowing you're among the very last of your fellow Americans to see the sun wave goodbye to the continent.

     One comes to California with certain expectations. For example, I always expect to see a movie star. But I never do. (It's the same in New York City. But in all the times I've been to Manhattan, I've never seen a famous face -- except once I think I saw Jacqueline Kennedy outside my taxi window standing on a street corner, but I'm not even sure if it was her.)

     I was wrong about another expectation as well. A couple of posts ago I guessed that there weren't many retired bloggers from California -- assuming not too many people retire to California, simply because it's too expensive. I don't know if many retirees move to California, but there are plenty of retired people in California. And among the bloggers are The Fifty Factor and Retired Syd at Retirement: A Full Time Job.

I didn't see Naomi Watts

     You expect to see young, beautiful people in California who are hiking or biking or surfing. You also do see a few homeless people (there's a guy living outside a convenience store down the street) who have truly come to the end of the road. All this is part of the California experience. But I have to admit, I am having trouble getting used to the time change. Not the jet lag, which slowed me down for a couple of days. But the realization that, by the time you wake up in California, the day is already half over on the East Coast. I feel like I'm constantly behind, trying to catch up with the rest of the country.

     It's only lunchtime, and the financial markets have already had their day. They close at 1 p.m.! The White House has had its daily briefing. Whatever else that has occurred in Washington is already history.

     Last week I was going to watch the Super Bowl. I've watched the Super Bowl plenty of times. It's always on at night. So I went about my day, figuring I'd tune in when I got home in the evening. I got back to my room a little after 6 p.m. and turned on the TV, expecting to catch the game. The game was almost over! I was right. It did start at 6:30. But that was in Indianapolis. In California it started at 3:30, and it was practically over by 6:30.

I didn't see Daniel Craig

     I think if I lived in California I'd feel like I was missing    out on most of what's going on in America. But my daughter, who is much more at home in California, has a different point of view. She likes the idea that everything else in the country has already occurred by the time you're done at work. That way, you go home and you know nothing else is going to happen. So you can relax and enjoy the extra three hours you have in the day.

     "Maybe that's why people are so laid back out here in California," I ventured. "They all have an extra three hours at the end of the day to chill out."

     And I thought, maybe that's why people in California feel like they're a little different from those of us in the East, the South and the Midwest. Whatever we do in the rest of the country -- by the time it gets to California, it's history. It's done. It's over. Like the Super Bowl.

But I viewed some beautiful sunsets over the Pacific