In a way, California is still my homeland. I lived there for fourteen years, longer than anywhere else I’ve lived since.

We fly in. The snow of the Sierras gives way to the goldish-brownish-greenish of January California fields. Against the fields and slopes are the deep blue-green of precious lakes. As we near San Francisco, we see the mountains, the bay, the suburbs.

California is, to me, an irony. Here is a land where so many people are environmentalists, yet water is a scarce resource. So many people live lives of excess, their wealth created by the worldwide demand for technology.

It’s funny to come back here, now that I know so much more about the world. Now that I know this is not how everyone lives, not the same culture as everyone lives in. Well, I knew that before. But I’d never seen it, and those stories of other people’s lives were just tantalizing fairytales.

Over this winter break, I’ve traveled to three different cultures, all within my own country. My New York State drivers permit is enough identification and paperwork. New York City was crowded, busy; easy to get lost in the tall buildings and sheer numbers of people. People’s ancestors were from all over the world.

Wisconsin is an older, more traditional land. Everyone knows everyone else in the rural areas. Except, of course the newcomers in the suburbs. People are smart for not having gone to college, yet their worldview seems narrow and intolerant in many aspects. People are tough and do things for themselves.

In the California Bay Area, everything is new. Yet, there are dozens of national parks preserved for posterity. Buildings must be shorter than a certain height due to earthquakes. Many people work in tech and computer industries. The culture is a mixture of Native American, Spanish, Western European, and Chinese and Indian cultures. A weird mix created by geography and society. It is a confusing culture, an open one in some respects. You have to grow up there to understand it.

We drive out to Half Moon Bay. I haven’t been there in years. While there is a cute little town, it seems somewhat empty. A fulfilled, peaceful sort of empty rather than an emptiness borne from loneliness and poverty. The trees and plants say hi to me, we remember you. Come home, they say.

Freedom. Running wild. The beach is our native land, the sun reflecting off the water. This is the edge of the largest ocean on Planet Earth. It is cold, especially at this time of year. Unlike on the East Coast, the beach is almost always owned by the government; unless it is preserved for wildlife or deemed unsafe, anyone can walk on it.

We visit Santa Cruz the next day. Crowded. Full of people. We got our first chickens at a feed store here. I did gymnastics at the gym. We visit the gym. It hasn’t changed much. Hugs. Chalk. New faces, though I recognize the coaches. My story was born from the gym, from the imaginary world I built with my sisters. It was a fun game, fun to have pretend meets when you were ten and five, eleven and six. It developed into a complete country, into complete characters I know better than my best friends.

We go back a few days later to the Aptos Beach. I hide my eyes as I pass our old house, remembering my poor statice plants that I neglected to do anything with. Surely they are dead now. Someday, I’ll grow my own plants again, the coral and the white with yellow flowers inside.

The railroad trestle still stands. I remember keeping statistics on the trains when I was eight, nine, older. Five engines was the max. Usually, there were around forty cars—occasionally, it was over a hundred. Eucalyptus trees hang over the steep hill to the arroyo that carries water to the ocean.

The path is the same, the playground and grass are the same. There are a few changes, but not many. We head down to the ocean. Bright blue set against the bright sky. The arroyo is the same, the little beach path the same. The raccoon that injured Tary-do lived in the arroyo. My brother and I walk along the little path. If you didn’t know where to find it, you probably wouldn’t. But despite the shifting sands and water, I find the rock forming part of the entrance.

I run along the ocean, dipping my feet in the water, searching for sand dollars, and taking pictures. The cliff is still there, the houses built right up on the edge looking like they might slide down a hundred feet to the beach are still there. I keep walking; I want to get to Rio Del Mar Beach and the Cement Ship. When I was five, in 1997, you were able to walk onto the Cement Ship. It was an easy walk from the Rental House that we lived in until we could move into our house. My dad would take me on walks and I would pick up driftwood and stuff from the beach.

Now, though, the furthest I can walk is the wharf. I can peer through the bars at the slowly decaying ship I vaguely remember being on.

I’ve been to this beach since before I could remember. I grew up with the ocean waves and the very being of the ocean. Here, the land seems alive. It is dead in New York, dead in Wisconsin. So green in spring and summer, yet dead. There isn’t that inner world, that inner communication. Just visiting California can’t make you see this. You have to grow up there to truly understand.
Here, you can be alone and happy. Here, you want to be alone to fully appreciate the silence. The beauty of the world. It is a different world out here.

It’s what made me want to be an environmentalist.