Eat, Laugh, Sit

considering that i explored the West Coast on last year’s vacation — a roadtrip titled Eat, Drive, See — i decided to go East for this year’s vacation, a 10-day long train trip that had me sitting on the Amtrak, traveling from Maryland to Maine. i made six stops along the way, visited with seven friends and slept in five different beds.

the stops included Baltimore, Maryland, for a visit with my big fat russian family (my parents were also there); a day trip to Washington, D.C., for a visit to the amazing Newseum; several days in Newport, Rhode Island, for nonstop laughs with old friends i knew when i lived in San Francisco; an overnight trip to Portland, Maine, for a visit with a cherished friend i hadn’t seen in 10 years; one night in Jersey City, New Jersey, hunting for guidos with my former doppelganger, whom i also knew from my SF days; and a few final nights in New York City for a visit with my favorite girlfriends from my grad school days at USC.

in short, it was an AWESOME vacation. it was also exhausting, mostly delightful, and sometimes insightful, producing many good times i’ll recount here in the coming weeks through a series of photo essays. but as good as it was, i was happy to come home again, to sleep in my own bed again, to brew my own coffee again and to see my cute pups again, who appear cuter than before.

because as much as i like the east coast — and i do really like it, A LOT — and as many fantasies as i have about winning the lottery and moving to a penthouse near the Park on the Upper West Side, i love Los Angeles infinitely more. and the ear-to-ear grin that spreads across my face when i’m flying into LAX and start seeing the city lights that mark the start of my big and complicated city lets me know that i only have one home. it’s a sweet home and it’s where my heart lives and it’s where i live, too.

Los Angeles, i’m yours.