Already Thinking About Leaving California

I keep a pretty close track of our net worth through Mint.com and I'm dreading the day the medical school loans hit and our net worth plummets into the negatives. On the bright side, I'm also looking forward to a potential residency somewhere where gas and groceries (our two largest monthly expenses) are not so expensive! Then again, the fruit in California by far surpasses the lack of variety elsewhere. Of course, the heat in the summertime here is also quite difficult and a trip to the beach is just too time consuming. Although, there is the option of the beach here.

As you can see, I vacillate periodically about our soon to be (guess it depends where we match right?) departure from California. I have started to slowly accumulate a list of the pros and cons of living in Southern California, and I'm hoping to maximize on the pros before we leave. Those would include, but are not limited to, seeing my parents and nearby family often (it's funny how my cousins all live nearby but we probably only get together for big holidays or events), eating lots of authentic and cheap Chinese, Korean and Thai food with a dabble of Japanese when my mom takes me (Andy isn't a huge fan of Japanese), loading up on Thrifty ice cream every week it's 2 for $5, getting boba and shaved ice from time to time, going to Hollywood Bowl before we leave, visiting the downtown LA fabric district some more for fabric and trim (for those craft projects I will one day get to), and maybe a trip to Disneyland.

My list isn't that extensive because in thinking it over, there's not much about So Cal that I'm really attached to besides my roots in Arcasia and the food here. Although I like shopping at the Grove and the Americana, I can live without both and in the limited time I've been away from home (think college, living on the westside and my short stint in San Jose), the local grocery stores and shopping malls are usually the first things I become acquainted with. Not because I am that crazy of a shopper, but because I like knowing where things are ahead of time. In case you didn't get the memo, I'm sort of a planner.

I also find comfort in the fact that my parents will probably never leave LA, so we will always be coming back. I know we're not leaving yet, but in many ways, I'm already thinking about leaving California and what it entails because we're going to be going out of town for a few weeks to Orlando for vacation and then Salt Lake City for a rotation Andy has with the University of Utah. That's a long time away from our lil LA apartment that has become home and it's going to be a sort of test drive for me while I'm there. When Andy's cousins were here, they kept exclaiming, "We don't have that in Utah!" and the more they commented on little things like the Chinese sausages and Yan Yans on sale at our local Costco to the nearby Chipotle and all the fro yo places, I started to fear the unknown and already began missing So Cal.

Much is the case with life. We often take for granted what we have, always thinking about what we don't have. Today, I'm going to stop thinking about leaving California and what I have to gain, and enjoy the things of California that are at my disposal now. I'm thinking, a work out at the outdoor mall with an amazing ginormous fountain that mimics the Bellagio's (but not that big), some fro-yo or boba and a visit to my community pool. It's the simple things in life that we tend to overlook and hate on... well, today, I'm not going to hate, I'm going to appreciate.