I think we take the sun for granted. I mean, yes, we would most certainly be dead without it, and then, well, I wouldn’t even be writing this, but there is a certain warmth, separate from physical, that we receive from the sun. It is always there, always rising from the east to the west.
There is an exchange that occurs in Lady Bird where Sister Sarah Joan and Lady Bird discuss the content of her college application essay:
“You clearly love Sacramento.”
“I do?”
“You write about Sacramento so affectionately and with such care.”
“I was just describing it.”
“Well, it comes across as love.”
“Sure, I guess I pay attention.”
“Don’t you think maybe they are the same thing? Love and attention?”
I grew up in southern California on the cusp of the County of Los Angeles (so, quite a distance from Sacramento; I also did not go to Catholic school like Lady Bird, but you get the point), where the sun’s canary glow is as sure as the next breath, and the sky weeps when the sun is nowhere to be seen, like a lover grieving their other half. Where the fickle breeze is a romantic respite, combing through your hair on a rice-cake-sticky afternoon. What a contrast to the weather I experience on the East Coast, where — nine times out of 10 — it feels like a perpetual state of doctor’s-office air conditioning. And there’s that stubborn, sharp wind that I cannot avoid getting smacked in the face with, despite my best efforts.
Sure, the East Coast is not without its own charms. Real white Christmases with actual visible snowflakes falling from the sky, so picturesque and sparkly I almost expect Frank Sinatra or George Michael to start singing from the heavens. Lots of trees, very green and tall. A really good public transportation system that I sometimes romanticize to compensate for the lack of a car. A lot of uninterrupted fields and flat land (which is actually quite a pretty sight, contrary to popular belief — very calming, very Jane Austen, very peaceful). A lot of other things that I am sure exist and are lovely can be found at some point living in this easternmost place, things which, I confess, I cannot articulate nearly as easily as my thoughts about the opposite shore. Who can blame me, when I have only lived here for a total of 18 months out of my almost 20 years of life?
So, you must understand; oh, how I love California. I have always loved California, but I have noticed I love it even more when I am away from it. I love wearing shorts and the softest T-shirt I own on a rare humid day here on the East Coast. I love how the sun looks when it begins to set just over the skyline, when its many lifelines stream over the rooftops in strips of sienna. I love the sunset orange that feels like a gift on brisk January days, a shade among a delectable palette of honey tones mixed with memories of childhood. I have most certainly paid attention to my home state for the more than 19 years of my life, maybe even most intensely during the past two. And it is now so unbelievably easy for me to say: I love everything about it.
It is an extremely difficult thing to admit to an emotion as strong and built-up as love. It takes eons to even notice it out of the corner of your eye, even longer to realize that it has suddenly chosen to sit cross-legged, playing patty-cake — thump-thump, thump-thump, faster still — with the walls of your beating heart. And once you have locked eyes with it, held hands with it, it is the only thing you can think of. You think of it when it’s there, even more when it’s not. You hear it in your favorite songs that remind you of salt-soaked hair; you see it in the greasy fingerprints on old sunglasses; you can nearly taste its scent of gasoline and desert-hot asphalt — together, oddly sweet.
So, perhaps I am biased. I will concede this possibility. Even though my dream is to live somewhere far and experience all shades of life, I will always belong to the Golden Coast. Do not be mistaken: The East Coast has its own signature moves, without a doubt. And yet, I will always, always favor California. I will always love the free flow of downtown Los Angeles; the bright tides of Santa Monica; the plain passion in Hollywood; the hand-painted cliffs of Laguna; the crinkled roads of San Diego; anywhere, anywhere on that square of the map.
I could be anywhere in the world, but, wherever it is, I will be reminded of my home back on the West Coast. And perhaps that is what loving something is: to see it everywhere, feel it everywhere. Even in places you’ve just begun to know yet are the happiest you’ve ever been to, you still feel the undying warmth of the sun.
Ayden Min is a sophomore majoring in International Studies from Los Angeles, Calif. She is a Copy Editor for The News-Letter.
