Out Of My Element

It has been almost two years since I moved "back East" and although I've been traveling from multiple areas of Southern California to Philadelphia at least once a year since I was born, I still don't think I will ever be able to really settle in. I'm sure most of this can be attributed to the fact that I'm living in a very rural area of Delaware that I never in my wildest dreams would have thought to call home but there are still other things weighing on my mind.

Ever since I was a little kid I remember being so proud that I had family in some distant land far, far a way. Whether it was Philly or even Italy, I really had a feeling of greater worth and pride. Any time I would hear something about Philadelphia or see the Phillies playing a game on TV, I would always get excited but it seems that has been fading ever since I started High School. No one cared where your family was from and it didn't matter. All that was there, was survival and trying to fit in somehow or at least just blend in so it became less and less important to me. Once I started living on my own in San Diego and having so many great times while doing so, it really put me in a niche I was happy with and the connection I once felt to the East Coast was gone.

I have only just recently realized my true happiness in San Diego when moving to and living in Delaware. I lived in Los Angeles for almost 3 years and that never even crossed my mind that I was truely happier in another place. Sure, I missed San Diego and the friends I had there but there wasn't really too much of a geographical or social difference to really seperate them. They had relatively all the same comforts that I enjoyed but it wasn't until after I moved out of LA that I could really see all the horrors it had to offer me in comparison to my hometown.

When I joined a band from Philadelphia and had to travel there for practices multiple times every month, I was able to escape the rural farm lands of solitude and stopped thinking so much about what I was missing by choosing to live there. Also, now that I have been spending so much time with my girlfriend, Heather, that lives there, the feeling of love and pride I once had for the City is returning even more, but only in small portions. Almost everyday I see something about San Diego and what little bit of pride I was starting to build is pulled back over to my hometown and swallowed whole.

The East Coast has many things that have disillusioned me and I still have the general feeling that I'm somehow missing out on what my life should be by not continuing it in San Diego whether it be the food, music scene or the people, but with talks of the future and plans there of, where my significant other and I would be living together in the City, I can sense both fear and excitement with being back in and out of my element.