Age is Like a Black Hole

I am down to the last 48 hours of my time in California. I struggle to comprehend that two years have passed already--age is like a black hole: the farther into it you get, the faster everything goes. What happened to the last 2 years of my life? While I had my nose immersed in Harrison's Internal Medicine, my life changed dramatically. I look through photos from my summer anatomy course in 2009 and I see 30 people who were then strangers, now my wolf-pack. I see that we were all thinner, cheerful and far less lined. Even the folks who are 3-4 years behind me in age are experiencing their first frown lines. Mine, however, are so deeply embedded that I'm strongly considering prophylactic Botox. If nothing else, it would keep me from going around with that stupid furrowed brow all the time (I even do it when I'm laying in bed trying to fall asleep). That way, maybe by the time I'm 40 I might actually only look 40.

But this process of moving away cuts me deeply. Far more than I ever imagined. It took me about 15 months to adapt to the shocking culture of So Cal, but once I did, I found that actually liked it. Turns out, I loved having an air conditioner! I thought of the greater LA area as "mine" in a sense, because it is the place where I began my new life. Now I wish I had not signed that Northwest Track contract back in 2008, because I am not ready to leave this place. I am currently in the "depressed" stage of the Kubler-Ross grief process.

Things I will miss about So Cal:

1. 6 international airports within a 45 mile radius, 1 of those only 15 minutes from my house.
2. Never having to plan any part of my wardrobe or day around inclement weather.
3. Yellow House street tacos
4. Adventures on Abbott-Kinney Blvd.
5. My wolf-pack/medical family
6. Cake and end-of-day free breads from Sweet Lady Jane's on Melrose
7. Chick-Fil-A
8. The Hollywood Posse
9. Driving the S-curves in the San Gabriels with the windows and the roof open
10. Never having to scrape the windshield in the morning

Things I will NOT miss about So Cal:

1. $1600 rent
2. Regularly having to go to no fewer than 3 grocery stores to find specific items
3. Broken sprinkler heads wasting water by the tens of gallons into the streets
4. The ever-fucking FREIGHT TRAINS that went by my house all the live-long day AND NIGHT
5. The brown sky
6. Stupidly expensive car insurance rates
7. Sitting on my ass 15 hours/day, every day, to study
8. Motorcycles zipping in between lanes in traffic, regardless of whether you're in gridlock or screaming along at 85 mph.
9. The county-wide panic attack that follows any form of rainfall
10. Hella sales tax