Days in Encinitas

I think that after finding my cowboy boots and the intensity of the experiences surrounding it, I fell into a bit of a slump. Halfway through the winter, the funny little dreams I’d left Canada seeking were essentially accomplished. Still. I felt largely directionless.

Weird. Shouldn’t the answers all have come to me?

Looking back, I now know that they had. At the time I couldn't understand the answers I was given, it didn’t really line up with that quasi American Dream I’d roped myself into. So, I asked myself what I felt I wanted now, this is what I wrote:

I want everyone to be free

To dance closely under brightly coloured lights

To laugh and spin in limitless ecstasy

I want everyone to share

To be close in quietness at nights end

To hold space for one another as darkness envelops

To breathe new life into one another in the new year

I felt at much greater ease heading down the coast this time, much more assured, open and calm. I leaned into the uncertainty, I was even able to release that pesky Transmission Paranoia for a bit. I think that knowing I was half way through this journey made it a lot easier to accept whatever laid ahead, and I drove south with the intention of enjoyment and soaking it all in. I’d gotten into this mode of trying to make something concrete for myself, trying to attain some idea I had of what I wanted to experience this winter, worried about if it didn’t all go well. I think at the beginning I was concerned about how much time lay ahead. “What if I spend all my money?” “What if it isn’t good?” “What if I don’t make it to the spring what will I do?”

“Am I making good choices?”

“Was this the right choice?”

I decided to stop asking myself, “Did I make the right choice?” and instead tried to offer myself to just make the best choice for the present confronting scenario.

Lots happened in the short span of time between leaving Santa Cruz and finding the sun I was searching for; I got some of the really great waves of my trip as I trucked down the coast, witnessed the big storm, acquired a black eye, and really started to reflect on the first half of the trip. I almost settled for a bit in Ventura, I spent a couple of days there but the rain caught up with me and as the first drops fell, wide eyed I was on the run again. I realized I was scared of the rain. In the physical sense, yes, I was in fact scared of the rain, I had no desire to sit in it in the van (which I think is fair enough) and I was going to run until I found sun. I think there was a metaphorical portion to it all too, and reflecting on it all began to question if this whole time, this whole big excursion leaving Canada, whether I had been running to something or away from it.

Some day in January, my hunt for the sun was complete. I landed in Encinitas with a lovely group of girls who invited me to park the van at their house. I’m still in awe of their generosity, opening their arms and lives to me and I can only describe that month in Encinitas as blissful. Time began to stretch out in front of me as an endless expanse, nothing was rushed or hurried, life began to lull into a pace that seemed akin with that of the natural world. It was a beautiful property, with a massive backyard, raised garden beds and big trees. It was as if someone had plucked their midcentury modern farmhouse and some of the land from out in the hills and dropped it right smack down in Encinitas, surreal and dream-like. Their home was an oasis in the hustle and bustle of the urban spaces lining the coast. We would sit on the back patio and sip coffee in the morning sun and talk for hours. We’d wander through the neighborhood collecting fruit off the trees. I surfed when I felt inclined, my favourite waves became Swamis and this other spot called Traps. They were just adjacent to this massive temple that sat just off the area’s main street. Like a watchful eye, the temple of Swami’s Self Realization Fellowship stole glances from in between the palm trees lining the strip, it oversaw the surf, and watched the last stragglers exit the dive bars. The girls house was a short walk from this big beach called Beacons, and I spent a good chunk of time learning the different sandbars there. At home, we would talk about personal philosophies, life lessons, lessons learned and to be unlearned, relationships, prospects and desires. Not a lot of work got done those first few weeks, but they were glorious. I’d fallen into a beautiful coming together of some really lovely women, all independent and inspirational in different ways. Picture all of this happening with Albert Hammonds “It Never Rains in Southern California” playing in the background.

A large theme of our conversations revolved around feeling into your personal desires and allowing yourself to follow them.

“Asking what do I want?”
”How does this feel intuitively?”

Finding areas of resistance to our desires and understanding it, undoing it. Discussing the fact that so often we’ve been made to feel like the way we do things or want to do them is wrong, which has lead to us breaking trust within ourselves and losing touch with our intuitive knowings that guide us. We talked a lot about ‘hustle culture’ and the ‘grind’, the capitalist blueprint for success lined out for us young folk. How in times of uncertainty its hard to not look to that as the path to take to secure our desires. I met an inspirational friend who was living against the grain for sure. On a mission from Rhode Island, he was learning from a local shaper when he could and living as a true surf bum. He was more core than I could be, about my age, living out of a silver 1980’s Mercedes station wagon. If not in the water, you could usually find him parked at Cardiff or by the train tracks overlooking Swami’s (you can probably still find him there).

I indulged in this period of glorious, glorious sun and lack of responsibilities, I indulged maybe even a little too much. I’m not a partier anymore, but party we did for a bit! What adventure doesn’t have a quick party pit stop? And within it all, those wishes I made at the beginning of January came true, they seemed to find me with ease once I’d asked for it. Through this period I had really and truly let go, even of myself a bit. One night we were at one of the local dive bars, an old man was sat at the bar drawing caricatures of the patrons, dimly lit by multi-colo8red Christmas lights that overhang the bar I watched for a bit and saw he seemed to be a very good judge of character. I had him draw me and he drew this big animated smiling character who was asking, “Where are we?”

20 days in Southern California flashed by. There was an intensity of outward experiences, receiving and embodying all this newness around me while forgetting to slow down and check in with myself. I didn’t write during this period and it felt a bit like turning a cold shoulder on myself. As if I was trying to hide and act out - like a kid again sneaking out of my parents house. Knowing that inevitably down the line it would catch up with me, just a matter of how long I could keep the schtick going. Like playing a game of chicken, but both parties were me.

“You wouldn’t keep turning your back if you weren’t trying to hide from your own destiny.”

I don’t know how everything works, being so transient and open in this phase of life I’m constantly questioning my path - trying to follow what feels good and flows. Things travelling felt like I was trying on new lives like little hats, I’d describe the hat I wore in Encinitas as a vintage cowboy hat subtly dusted with sparkles. And although this indulgence and fun was welcome, it wasn’t to be my forever, it couldn’t be. One day, upon the usual sunbathing coffee routine, I stood up abruptly, breaking from my dream-like state I put my pants on and announced, “I’m going to get a job.” After a short walk I came back about half an hour later with a job. I was going to quality control and repack used beach tents in a warehouse, getting the full American experience - warehouse job and all! So, I did that for the rest of my time there, the hours were loose and the work itself was mellow.

When mid February hit, I think my trip had come to a natural end. I was tired of being in flux, and I think that being so open-ended with my travels and setting out with the intentions to receive and embody all of the newness around me I drifted from myself a bit. A bit of a loss of soul it could be described as. I was still scared of the rain, I was trying to hold on and wait out the winter down in southern California, I think also still holding onto that American Dream I’d been chasing. The sense that I was going to craft myself a perfect new life by the will of being here and doing it.

I learned some lessons in indulging in life’s pleasures. There’s a balance between temptation and discipline. Can you have happiness, bliss, and fun without discipline? I don’t think so, I think it becomes unsustainable. Discipline is the humbling portion, it keeps me on check within the trajectory that I want. Without it, the fun inevitably runs out, it keeps you chasing more. I remembered that its really important to have boundaries and understanding the balance between discipline and indulgence. I’ll often cram myself into something so rigid that I stop having fun, too much discipline, and then I hit a breaking point and have maybe too much fun. Balance, balance, balance! Its important to indulge as well - if we’re not here enjoying life’s pleasures what are we doing here?

I think I was getting confused though, and a bit lost in it all. I’d been gone for what had felt like a long time, life in Tofino and the days on the road with B felt as if they occurred in another life, existed in another realm. About a week or so before leaving Encinitas I woke in the wee hours of the morning.

Bury your face in your hands and you are awake.

The phrase repeated in my head in my half-slumber, semi-conscious it rolled around bouncing off the sides of my skull. I was only able to sleep again after I wrote it down, I forgot about it until later that day when I found the note. I didn’t know what it meant.

Another storm was coming to hit California, contrary to what Albert Hammond says it does in fact rain in southern California. I’d been on the road for nearly 5 months now and I was tired. So, I did one final look around for something to make me stay, checking around corners and in any inkling of opportunity that presented itself. C’mon answers to the rest of my life! Appear now please! I dotted my i’s and crossed my t’s, making sure there wasn’t a reason to try and stay. Nothing was to make me stay, I’d searched sufficiently and found lots, but all my options were exhausted and there was nowhere left to run (I contemplated Baja, but reasoned that the storm was to hit there too and I’d just sit in the mud if I went). So, it was time to leave, and although heartbroken in many ways to be leaving I realized that I wasn’t scared of the rain any more. I was ready to face it, literally I was going to drive straight into the rain up the coast and then go sit in it in Tofino, and figuratively in the sense that I was ready to address what I’d maybe been running from.

Days before I left, the girls hosted a dinner party. One of the guests intrigued by my story asked what the hardest thing I’d done was.

I contemplated it for a long while. I’ve adventured alone, tried to really push my physical limits, crammed myself into regimented routines and schedules, experienced great heartbreak, gotten a science degree (I’m not a good or natural scientist), lost loved ones, moved across the country chasing dreams, left lives behind, experienced great internal depressions.

“Facing myself.” I answered.

Not because it was necessarily the most painful or life-altering, but because it seems to be this continual run-around and process that I try to evade. I think I’m often running from myself and my place in the world, trying to ignore the parts that I don’t like or want to hide.

He spoke about disappearing and asked me what he should prepare for if he were to embark on a solo-adventure that he desired. One that really put him out of his comfort zone. I told him that he was going to face himself, and wide-eyed he looked at me and told me that until that moment he didn’t realize that he had never truly faced himself. Who he was beyond the things, connections, and identity holders that bound him to his current life and reality.

How do we end up in the lives we’re living? Is it out of conscious choice?

I told him, on his journey, to accept help. That people are good and kind and we can’t do it all alone. I also told him that the only way for him to get where he wanted was to go there. If we want anything in life, to exist in a certain state or way, the only way to get there is to go there.

Within the last few months of being at home before leaving I think I was looking to escape the life I knew. When I left Canada, I’m sheepish to admit that I was a bit tired of life as it existed. I was ungrateful with regards to the life I had and yearned for more. I was chasing more, and I’d thought I was running to some sort of new life, and I was in ways. In doing so though, I forgot to really hang onto some parts of me while integrating into and receiving these other lives, trying to find one that fit. I think the hat I went home with is the same as the one I’d left Canada with - it’s my own unique hat. In this process, after it felt as though I’d drifted from myself in the pursuit of more, I ran smack back into the me that had left Canada five months prior. I think I’ll have learned to keep myself closer the next time I go, and after it all, I’m far more awake to the beauty of a life that I’d been trying to leave behind.

When it did come time to actually leave Encinitas, of course I drug my feet and second guessed it a bit. I really did love and cherish the people I’d found in this beautiful little pocket of Southern California. One of my new friends was even seriously offering to marry me so that I could stay, a testament to the hearts of the people I’d stumbled upon. But alas, I was ready to go, it was not to be my forever! I still don’t know what is to be my forever.

Everything will change every day

Be where you are now

Remember each state is temporary, let each flow through you and welcome the next

So, back up the coast I went.