My mom nodded and cried when I told her I was moving back to Los Angeles. My father pursed his lips together in that disapproving manner, and my brother literally facepalmed. Hadn't LA completely kicked my ass 18 months ago? Hadn't I JUST settled down, gotten my bearings and begun to heal? The dust from my divorce had barely settled and the scar tissue was still fresh. I had a Florida job, I had built a Florida life... but I'm a California Girl with a California heart.
And the heart, having broken and regrown anew, needed to go back to California.
The comparisons were painful- my brother likened my situation to a desperate gambling addict at a slot machine, pumping quarter after quarter into a one-armed bandit. "Maybe THIS time... OK maybe THIS time..." Others compared it to a battered spouse going back to her abuser. "But they swore they were gonna change..."
The first time I went to LA, I was a starry-eyed dreamer full of hopes and expectations. This was wrong of me. Just like a 15-year old assumes they know how to drive because they've ridden in a car, it doesn't amount to jack shit when they're actually behind the wheel. This was the case with Los Angeles. I came in all excited with my learner's permit, got seriously distracted by my passenger, lost focus and inevitably crashed and burned.
Let me be clear: I do NOT blame my passenger. Let me be clearer: it is not Jay's fault that I got as bad as I got, sinking deeper and deeper into depression and self-abuse. It is not the city's fault, either. There are many factors in catastrophic disaster, and just as I cannot fully assign responsibility to my passenger or the road itself, as "the Driver" and captain of my destiny, I must assume responsibility for my collision with said destiny.
We'd left Florida under bad circumstances, in the wake of job layoffs, my parents' divorce, my best friend moving away and the birth of my brother's second child. I felt a severing of ties and knew that the relationships I'd cherished at home would be forever altered- and so I begged, and begged- I'd waited 8 years, after all, for HIS jobs to work out, for HIS stars to align... he was reluctant, but I eventually wore him down, and convinced him it was the right thing to do.
Husband by my side, (so I thought) he went kicking and screaming, but "we" went to LA.
(note: I was the one who waited. I chose to depend on his timeline. And I begged him until we finally left. Realizing my hand in sculpting the impending disaster has been good for me- he never even wanted to go.)
When we arrived, the inevitable fissures ruptured, and as our relationship crumbled, I crumbled too, blaming the environment the whole time. "LA Ate My husband," was the potential book title. The more he pulled away, the more resentful I became, and it surely showed in my demeanor and physical appearance.
Behind closed doors, my stress was consuming me. I'd complain to him that my gums were bleeding, my hair was falling out. He'd take a slant-ways glance at the clumps of hair in my hands and shrug it off, telling me it was normal. Then he'd go back to his video games. Yes, this was a dick move- but it was NOT the city's fault. And it was my fault for not recognizing his apathy for what it was. It's my fault for trusting him to be right.
No WONDER I wasn't getting jobs. No WONDER none of the opportunities I'd been expecting had opened up to me- I was sick, I was hurting. I didn't want to be around me, my own husband didn't want to be around me, so why would anyone else? At some point I must've decided to win my husband's attention by needing him, which drove him further away, but I was stuck with the cosmic kick-me sign I'd taped on my own back. And where Jay didn't notice, the city surely did.
As the months wore on, and he left, I was pumping nothing but bile and acid through my own veins. The self-sabotage and body abuse I'd indulged in became the only ritual I could count on- the only thing which seemed in my control. I was desperate, scared, hungry and angry- and the city could smell it on me. The more I made myself bleed, the more the sharks attacked.
You get what you give, so naturally, a string of horrible situations snowballed after Jay bailed. Out of subsequently hotter frying pans and into increasingly raging fires, I think I was probably trying to kill myself the same way someone commits Suicide By Cop. I was taunting Los Angeles, subconsciously begging it to end my pain before I had to take matters into my own hands. Los Angeles responded in force, by starving me out and frankly, just sucking Everything which could possibly go wrong went wrong- because I needed it to.
I was terrified of my surroundings, and everywhere I looked I found scary ranting homeless people, random strangers bleeding on sidewalks, murder scenes (hello neighbors!), and poop on the sidewalks. And off the sidewalks. Pretty much everywhere I looked I saw shit. Why? Because I was looking for shit.
When I was giving off all that bad energy, I attracted bad things. When I came with my hands outstretched and empty, expecting things to be placed in them, I was left wanting. When I was scared, I was scary, and scary things became my constant companions.
I crumbled and burst into flames and exploded and burned and shattered and ended. My brother came, scooped up my remains and brought them back home.
Then, I got better. I got lots better. It took about a year and a half. It meant lots of home cooking, sunshine, and exposure to unconditional love from my family, who held me while I cried. It took some wonderful friends who restored my trust in men by sleeping by my side until I learned to sleep alone again. It took a LOT of levity- mostly at work, with my comedy roles, and making others laugh until my own genuine laughter was resparked. In concentrating on others, even just for a little while at work or spending time with my pals, I finally got out of my own head. I was resting, I was eating. And I was healing.
I took an amazing get-your-shit-together seminar by Landmark Education, which helped a lot. I spent some time at a Buddhist Retreat. That helped a lot too. I spent a couple nights in a treehouse, and attended a ful moon sweatlodge ceremony in the forest. That helped a LOT. I dated some really beautiful boys and learned about what I like and what I don't like when it comes to relationships. Ohhhmigod that helped too.
I remember sitting on MY couch in MY home, laughing at a really awesome and completely inappropriate joke on a comedy show when I felt a familiar glow strike up in my heart, like a pilot light had suddenly been ignited. "Hello Ember. I know you."
I didn't know how, I didn't know when, but I knew I needed to go back to LA and fight for my new dream as my new self. I was finally brave enough to want something again.
California hadn't changed. Not one bit. But I certainly had. In dissolving to ash and Phoenixing my way out of the crematorium I'd constructed for myself, I'd become rebuilt of sterner stuff. And I was ready.
Like the chain event of bad stuff which had kicked my ass before, a completely unexpected chain event of good stuff happened as soon as I was ready and Babe Ruth'd my intentions. I suddenly had the means to go west.
And so I went back swinging- I was changed. I'd been behind the wheel, I know how to drive and I know how to crash. The absolute worst had already happened, and I was no longer afraid. When someone is fearless (for whatever reason) the Universe responds to that, too. I was full of fresh stories, fresh ideas- I came with my hands full to GIVE to the city, to contribute. I was the opposite of the negative me, and I have had the opposite of the experience I went through.
A HUGE part of What Helped was accepting responsibility for what was happening and how I was responding to it. I'd become highly reactive, pinging off at the slightest "boo." Making decisions based on pressure and fear lead to some horrible decisions. Blaming my ex for EVERYTHING (especially the horrors that happened to me AFTER he left) was a waste of energy. I realized my shared part in the demise of our relationship. I realized how much better off I was without someone who would treat me like that and abandon me in the condition in which I was left. I realized how toxic I'd been and stopped blaming Los Angeles for giving me exactly what I was begging for. I stopped hurting myself, and made a point of learning how to protect myself against ever making those mistakes again, or depending on anyone else for my happiness.
If I'm going to allow an absolute idiot to determine my mood, that idiot will be ME.
I became calmer. I became strong. I was over my grief- I'd mourned the miscarriage of my marriage and my dream, and all that remained of my disaster was anger. Harnessing my anger as a fuel was invaluable- and figuring out how to let it go was... well... priceless. But that's another story.
LA's my friend now. The city has opened up like a hand to hold, receiving me with the same embrace I felt when I collapsed, broken, into my mother's arms. But like my mother nurtures the broken, LA favors the bold. It is a city designed for the fearless, and living within her parameters means I'm now eligible to play the game.
Amazing stars aligned themselves to provide for me- everything I needed, from a roof to roommates to furniture to jobs to a new car- EVERYTHING has lined up to bring me where I am now- which is happy, on my own steam.
Naturally, this is the exact moment I met my soul mate, in the right place right time, like a welcome home gift.
...but that's another story too- one I can't wait to share with you.
I don't need to be famous- I don't need to be rich. I DO need to write, and I need to be in California.
The advice I'd offer to the starry-eyed dreamers of the world who want to chase their LA dreams is this: come out, by all means. Crash, burn, and LEARN. Take responsibility for what happens, and definitely don't take any bad luck personally.
You can change your stars, as soon as you accept that you ARE the stars.
