Take Off

I wanted to wait til I was actually excited to start writing. As the initial milestones passed, as I bought my plane tickets, I moved home, I started packing, I went on my last camping trip, I had my last dinner in my house, I left Nevada City, I flew out of San Francisco, as everyone asked if I was excited or not, I realized that it wasn’t going to happen. I think I wait to be excited til I'm actually traveling, when weight of the trip actually hits you, rather than in preparation. I was missing too many little details to wait any more. So here I am, kind of gone, kind of not, beginning to write about what I have been calling (to myself mostly) Switzapore Adventure Camp. Petrina suggested Switzapore, as I had been calling it Singerland, after my brain began to merge the two given their proximity in my conversation for the past few months. Really anything is better than saying 'Switzerland and Singapore,' that's just a mouthful.

Before I tell you where I am now (ooo isn’t the excitement overwhelming!) I should explain ‘Adventure Camp.’ Straight up, it’s a 14 month MBA program. I’ll be in Switzerland from September to March and Singapore from March until November. But in my mind I have always sort of imagined this to be more of an adventure than business school. I guess that’s partially because business school is not really the main reason I’m going, but more of an excuse for funded travel and something to keep me busy. Yes, it will be very useful as well, but this is not too highly focused of a trip. So that’s where Adventure comes from. Now these emails I get, from both St Gallen and Nanyang Technical, remind me of camp. Its a small group of us (40 and 120 respectively, 6 of us cross over into both classes in the double degree program), there are all sorts of little packing lists and maps and get to know you activities and various other tidbits don’t remind me of college so much really. Combined with the fact that its so short, my mind brings up camp. Friends who have been through masters programs tend to laugh at me when I say that, but we’ll see.

Ok, so back to reality. I left Nevada City on Thursday morning, an hour late, at 6am. Molly, Warren, Hannah and Oso packed up the truck for their own adventure up to Ekone Horsey Camp (yeah I have amended its name too, but it really is all of those things). Amara is staying home to work, which is really exciting for her – a first summer at home with a car. I hadn’t finished packing when I went to bed on Wednesday night and when I couldn’t fit my toiletries, the bottle of Maker’s Mark Bram gave me for a going away present, my tweed briefcase or Vanessa & Leonard’s wedding gift, I decided (right about the time we were supposed to leave) to repack. I took out my computer monitor and sleeping bag, crammed the true necessities in and threw it all in the truck. I ate one last Lewis Road burrito and we took off.

I had to go to a mobile conference and I was significantly less than thrilled about it. Violently less than thrilled actually. Great combo, right? Leaving when it’s still dark, saying goodbye to your home, car and friends and heading to a conference. About phones. When I got there the first speaker was in a ballroom with green lighting around him. All I could think was that there were no windows and green lights sure suck compared to trees. Luckily the second panel was in a room with windows and was about mobile gaming, something I have been spending a substantial amount of my time doing and have a vested interest in. I started to finally come around and by the time the brought out lunch I was nearly recovered. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still REALLY sad to be leaving and I think about the trees pretty much every minute, but I wasn’t so angry about it. I remembered what I had set out to do and that I did somewhere, deep down, under all of the camping and farming and bluegrassing and Americaning, I do want to get some other shit taken care of before I lay down my hat.

So off I go. We left for the airport from Petrina’s house pretty late (surprise, surprise) but I made it no problem. My bags were still overweight and I got a text from Will saying he had to run up to SF and wouldn’t be able to pick me up from the airport in LA, but I still made it. I got a rental car and I drove into Crenshaw to get Phat N Juicy Burger as soon as I landed. Sadly, PNJ had been downgraded to a B health inspector rating and per a rule made long ago, I could not eat there. But, worry not. There was a Louisiana Fried Chicken right next door! Seven minutes later I had three chicken strips, spicy rice, BBQ sauce, a large coke and a hot roll. All is right in the world.

I drove north from there, planning to get up to my favorite beach, Point Dume in Malibu. When I saw signs for the Getty Villa I made a snap decision to go there instead. I pulled in and was asked for a ticket, which I obviously had not. The guy asked what I was doing, where I was coming from and why I was there. Even though he said the Getty isn’t a spur of the moment kind of place, he let me in and gave me a free ticket.

I wandered around the gardens til I found a good spot to make some phone calls and lounged around until they kicked me out, very pleasantly, “The Getty apologizes for interrupting your meditative state. Please come back again.” Since Will wasn’t coming in for another few hours, I drove up to Point Dume. It was 5 so the traffic was slow, but I put on some fiddle music and blissed out in the setting sun. It’s hard to mind traffic when you have no agenda. I also know I won’t be enjoying driving again for a long time, and although I didn’t have my lovely little Honda, I was still pretty happy to be behind the wheel.

Apparently Point Dume is a totally different world in the summer. The front parking lot was packed, the back lot (my favorite place, where you can sit in your car and watch dolphins, sea lions, pelicans AND the waves) was $7 and the secret beach was about a foot wide. No less epic though.


I made it to Will's finally and in the morning I'll be off to Vanessa's wedding.