No Lifeguard Today

Sometimes I have to pinch myself. Am I really here? Through my stuffed up nose I just smell air, stripped of Ocean. At the foot of the ocean it seems like there's a lot more air. Right now the water is pulling away from me and it will continue retreating until 2:34pm. It will creep back by 8am. The barnacles are beginning to show on the pier footings like hairy legs. There's a guy with an amish-looking beard, a beer belly and very liberal g-string who keeps glancing at me. I've got my DMV appointment for Wednesday, new retro table acquisition on wednesday and another meeting with my spanish tutor on Thursday and I'm taking an adoptive dog to Dog Beach on Friday. There's no excuse not to be busy in this city nor is there an excuse not to fully, deeply relax with so much ocean so available. This thursday evening I'm heading to the Contemporary Art Museum overlooking the Pacific in La Jolla. They're re-opening after a year of remodeling. This was one of the first places Aunt Muriel took me 15 years ago when I first visited San Diego and my first exposure to the questions of contemporary art. Muriel is a lover of the Old Masters so she definitely took me for my benefit. With school starting only part time in January I can approach my priorities from other angles. There is so much modern design and old design to interact with. Little Italy has some really fun new buildings that I want to walk up to and touch. There are mid-century apartment buildings around every corner and southern california as a whole is stuffed with notable buildings/architects both on and off the beaten path. My perogative in the absence of full-time class will be to get to know these buildings as intimately as possible and with a technical understanding of how they're built. My other priority is to learn Spanish. Mexico is only 20 min. away and there's a lot of development going on in Baja California. In 3-5 years I want to be able to take part in that growth as a designer. I don't think we give those who have feet in two countries (legal or illegal) the due credit for living two languages and two cultures. So far, I can't even get past rolling my "R's".