My town does not resemble LA’s Sunset Boulevard or the city lights in San Francisco Bay. From the 1980’s to mid 1990’s (I graduated in 1995) about 8,000 people resided within the city limits. There’s no thrill about it. In fact, one of my highlights growing up was when McDonalds propped up on Coalinga’s infamous Elm street drive, which was also the same evening we finally switched from stop signs to signal lights (but only at the intersection by McDonalds).
And of course, (like most of my high school years) I was grounded the evening McDonald’s opened their doors. (and no, I’m not still bitter at all)
But my town also has a special spark. I’ve known one of my best friends since I was four, I could ride my bike to school in the middle of the street for hours on end, and my mom let me ride around the block with our postman Ace, before the age of six (who also collected the ticket stubs at every Friday night football game).
Even more, everybody knows everyone’s business, parents have radio scanners to hear high school parties interrupted by flashing lights, I’ve probably dated the same guy more than once, and the options for high school personal identifiers are (or least back then) limited.
For example, if you were gay, you kept your mouth shut. If your attire didn’t’ resemble the “in” crowd, you stood by the waterless fountain catty corner from the high school steps, and mainly white folks hung outside on the east side stoop, while Latino folks stood inside the main entrance hallways on the opposite side of the 3 part building.
Don’t get me wrong; we all celebrated our devoted hatred for Coalinga high school life every Friday and Saturday night. The elephant in the living room merely presented itself in the most interesting ways.
Moving forward:
I had ants in my pants after my high school graduation until about 2000. I moved from San Luis Obispo, (gotta love Stenner Glen student housing), back to Coalinga, then to Santa Rosa, San Francisco, Fresno (the city life for central valley folks), back to San Francisco, and then to Kansas City, Missouri. And yes, Kansas City is in both Kansas and Missouri.
I don’t know what my problem was, or maybe I did a little. I was trying to figure out who I was, where I was going, and what all of this – my life- really meant.
My time in Kansas City, while filled with desperate heartache, bursting laughter, and meeting new family faces, my time in KC helped me figure out where I wanted to go.
Currently, I work as a research assistant at a non-profit organization. In the mean time, I’ve also let my little blog slide away. Hopefully I’ll return soon….
