Yeah I come from California- God is green . . . eyes are blue.

Whenever I experience beauty, I always have a sudden urge to write. To pick up a pen, pencil, or open up a Word document and try to capture that beauty. To attempt at finding the perfect words and phrases that will describe feelings, smells, sights, tastes, and sounds of beauty. Tonight I went on a run, which has become customary of my evenings here in San Francisco. It's more of an obligation that comes with my steps towards bettering myself: mind, body, and spirit aligned. But tonight it was a pleasure, a very rare occurrence, so I tried to relish it and I will try to describe here what I saw, smelled, heard, and felt:

I saw the sky. It was dusk, my favorite time of day, when the clouds turn pink and the setting sun turns the whole city golden. I ran up the Harry stairs (all 230 of them) and then around the entirety of the top of the ridge, glimpsing the glinting and glowing city every few seconds as it bobbed in and out between the houses. When I reached Billy Goat Park, I experienced the same sense of weightlessness that keeps me coming back there--I felt on the top of the world and that I could hold the entire city before me and the Bay beyond in my grasp. I would like to go to this spot at any time of day and I am sure that it each hour has its own character. I saw the fog as it advanced over the top of Twin Peaks, threatening to take over the city with its blanket of mist. It was like a scene in a movie, when the storm advances, foreshadowing the coming of evil. When I came over the top of Diamond Blvd, the sun had disappeared over the top of the hill, leaving only a glowing strip of light that speckled through the mist of the fog, turning its underside into light.

I smelled the pungent mix of clean air, hyacinth, Indian food, marijuana, licorice, and laundry (my favorite smell)

I heard the happy and uplifting music in my ear buds--I was listening to a mix that I made for a beach trip I took with Lindsay two summers ago. It reminded me of the carefree, blissful time with a dear, dear friend--a combination of the Goo Goo Dolls, bluegrass, the Dandy Warhols, oldies, the Indigo Girls, "A Dios de Pido," G. Love, and Gary Jules, who I have named this post after.

I felt exhilaration in my muscles, a burning feeling that kept me going and my legs moving. I felt that gasping, straining pain in my chest but somehow I wanted to keep running, to conquer stair cases and hills. I felt like my legs could take me anywhere. The beautiful thing is, they can!

"Ecstasy is all you need,
Living in the big machine,
Now..."
-the Goo Goo Dolls

la famille, la maison

the words "family" and "home" are interesting to me, two words in the English language that are both interconnected and constantly changing. as a twenty-something young woman, my concept of family and home has become extremely complicated

first of all, living in three cities during one year is complicated. at the youth to youth conference in LA, introducing myself was hard. do i tell people where i am currently living (san francisco, with my aunt and uncle), where i go to school and where i will be officially living in three weeks (seattle, jefferson st.), or where i am from and from where i pull my identity (portland)?

what it all comes down to is finding a compromise...considering a combination of these three cities to be my home

i associate my childhood, my high school years, my beautiful friends who have known me the longest, my immediate family, the house i have lived in since i was born, and my nostalgia of the 10 bridges, powells, urban forest, and hidden staircases with portland, oregon. talking to Liane at the Foundation yesterday about our tie to different places, I associated the nostalgia and community that she feels about hawaii with my own hometown. there is something about portland that only Portlanders can understand- this fierce obsession, love, and pride that comes with living in such a livable, small-town-in-a-big-city. because of this, i don't think i can ever detach myself from calling portland "home," no matter where i go in life. 2735 will always be my permanent address (as far as I know!) and most of myself was created here.

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I associate discovery, independence, expanses of water, ferries, community, love of academia, sitting around with good food, wine, and company, and freedom with seattle, washington. in the last few months, especially, i have missed Seattle more than I have missed Portland. Almost entirely because of the people that I have met there, but I think that this can contribute to one's idea of home more than anything else. Yesterday I received a text from a good friend that said, "you need to come home! and yes, seattle is your home now." Even though I don't have any plans to stay in Seattle past June, at least for the coming year, Seattle has creeped into me and yes, I do think that I can call it home. I have lived there for three years independently, had my first apartment there and will be moving into my second soon. I have learned to love the city, its quirks, its people, its walkability, it's expanse, Seattle U, the family I have found there, and have learned to be annoyed at its less-than-efficient public transportation system (at least compared to pdx or sf).

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I associate restfulness, exploration, independence, public transportation, metropolis, identity as a twenty-something, and my corporate experience with san francisco, CA. i have only lived here for three months, but i have already begun to deeply love this city. i have been coming here to visit on my own for thirteen years now, to the point where the house on sanchez and my family there have become a second house and family. I don't think I realized this until I came to live here, how much my visits to san francisco have affected me over the years. you can never have a true grasp of a city until you live there, of course. when I arrived in June, I only had a rudimentary understanding of sf's geography and transit system, but I feel as though I have a handle on it now. working full time and feeling completely integrated into the corporate systems here have prevented me from exploring the city as I'd like, but that only inspires me to want to return. September 9th will not be the end of my relationship with this city and I hope to come back when life leads me this way again

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...and then there's family. i like to think of family in a broad sense. i have some pretty incredible people in my life, some friends that are too close and special to be considered friends. they are family. my sense of connection to family members has changed throughout the last few years. Becoming more independent has made me want to cultivate deeper connections with my family members, immediate and extended. I send more letters and texts to my Grandma, call my mom more often, and have added all my cousins, aunts, and uncles on Facebook. I have come to realize that despite all these strong connections with friends, family will always be there. My brothers and I will always have an inseperable bond. I may want to live in Cleveland at some point to connect more with my family ties there. I have also have come to accept that family does not have to mean just these people. Family can be what i think it to be. Two of my closest friends came to visit me in SF a couple weekends ago, friends who I consider family. There is a certain comfort, an ease of laughter, a lack of self-consciousness with them that I associate with family.

The thing that is most overwhelming is that I am only twenty-one years old! I can't even begin to imagine how my web of "family" and "home" will continue to increase as I get older, live more places, meet more people, establish strong connections, and even have a family of my own. How exciting! bring it on...

and so it begins

i've only been in the city for an afternoon and i've already discovered so many wonders. san francisco is such a beautiful city. not as green as seattle but it makes up for it in my mind with its expanse of beautiful houses. every hillside is covered with a mulitcolored patchwork of architecture, each with its own character and charm. no cookie cutter houses here

my aunt and i went on a brisk walk this evening before dinner, and aside from the fantastic views from noe valley, i really felt at peace with how this summer is going to unfold. realizing my comfort in this house, a house i have known my whole life with family that have known me just as long, is very exciting and really puts myself in a good place to jump into work tomorrow with gusto.

i unpacked and set up my room today. i'm lucky enough to share a room with a bowflex machine who i hope will become my friend this summer. even better than this is that i have an old turntable and sound system right next to my bed. i unpacked to the band and michael jackson, but there's a wealth of original 60s and 70s vinyl to be discovered here!

i forgot about how lush the backyard is. our childhood sandbox has been turned into an herb garden, there's lettuce, squash, and broccoli planted haphazardly, and nasturshums are growing everywhere else except for the logan berry plot. the best part of the backyard is the view of the entire city (pictures to come) and the treehouse that dylan used to use in elementary school. i have a weird but awesome fascination for treehouses, so i forsee this as a potential reading anc city-gazing hideout.

tomorrow i start work at shinnyo-en. i'll be venturing into a 12 hour day at the national conference on volunteering and service which should be exciting, stimulating, and exhausting(http://www.volunteeringandservice.org/). more to come about this! all i know is that work life and home life are going to be equally gratifying and exciting. coming home to watch the sunset over san francisco and play a few songs on my aunt's original 1970s guitar doesn't sound to shabby to me and i'm sure i will relish in it all