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Icecicleland
Mar. 6th, 2003 07:44 pmI grew up in southern california, first 13 years in North Hollywood (in THE VALLEY) and then the next 12 years in Corona del Mar, which is about an hour south of LA. CdM is a lovely location, back then it was a small beach town that had summer houses and summer rentals. Now it's a trophy location for the very very rich. Primarily, I think, because of the weather. It's perfect. It ranges from a warm that's not warm enough to induce sweating to a cool that's only at night, and only enough to need a sweater. I go back there every year for Xmas and I wear shorts during the day, at night shorts or levis and sweatshirt. It's the perfect "no weather" weather. It can be dry during the santa ana winds when the free ions in the air cause you to get a shock when you touch things and that send your brain into a sort of light-acid fascination with things you wouldn't ordinarily notice. It can be damp when the fog rolls in, the eerie quiet where all you hear is the dripping of condensation and the foghorn in the bay and the wet-friction-sound of the intermittent car driving by, its sound-arc notice-makingly compressed in time (don't hear it until it's right there, and then it's gone and silent drip drip drip again.)
So that's what I grew up in. Left there at the age of 25 for the east coast.
Today was weird cuspy weather. Rainy and cold this morning, no hat and no muffler and no gloves but my hands were cold. Train into Manhattan and then it's starting to be bouncing rain - not yet hail but not just wet drops, you notice it bouncing. Train to Wall St and then it's small hail that becomes suddenly puffy, but mostly you notice that you have to be careful not to fall because the hail is really ice and ice on the ground is slippery. Up to the 18th floor and it's snow. Small snow, then full snow, then clumpy snow. I love clumpy snow. Snow that wetly sticks to itself. It's active in a way that cold fast snow is not.
(work day, walk to gym, return, leave)
The most amazing man on the subway. Thick, solid, hairy, dark, his hands made me throw wood.
I have a mile walk from where the subway lets me off (NYC Time Out article on why new yorkers are thinner than most americans: we walk, we heft, we schlep, we pump, we graze.) It's a "transitional" neighborhood, we're the first gay couple there. It's mostly black, some latino, and some left-over italian from before the neighborhood became black. And it was lovely. Everything had been coated with water in some form, the water melted a bit, and as the temperature dropped it formed icecycles. Cars had them from rear view mirrors and bumpers. Streetlights had them, stoplights had them and the they all would capture and diffract the light. Trees were decorated with them. They'll be gone in the morning, but that walk home was one off the things I cherish about living in a place with weather.
So that's what I grew up in. Left there at the age of 25 for the east coast.
Today was weird cuspy weather. Rainy and cold this morning, no hat and no muffler and no gloves but my hands were cold. Train into Manhattan and then it's starting to be bouncing rain - not yet hail but not just wet drops, you notice it bouncing. Train to Wall St and then it's small hail that becomes suddenly puffy, but mostly you notice that you have to be careful not to fall because the hail is really ice and ice on the ground is slippery. Up to the 18th floor and it's snow. Small snow, then full snow, then clumpy snow. I love clumpy snow. Snow that wetly sticks to itself. It's active in a way that cold fast snow is not.
(work day, walk to gym, return, leave)
The most amazing man on the subway. Thick, solid, hairy, dark, his hands made me throw wood.
I have a mile walk from where the subway lets me off (NYC Time Out article on why new yorkers are thinner than most americans: we walk, we heft, we schlep, we pump, we graze.) It's a "transitional" neighborhood, we're the first gay couple there. It's mostly black, some latino, and some left-over italian from before the neighborhood became black. And it was lovely. Everything had been coated with water in some form, the water melted a bit, and as the temperature dropped it formed icecycles. Cars had them from rear view mirrors and bumpers. Streetlights had them, stoplights had them and the they all would capture and diffract the light. Trees were decorated with them. They'll be gone in the morning, but that walk home was one off the things I cherish about living in a place with weather.
