Every time I visit my parents in LA, we always end up playing tourists. It’s like I just discovered that LA is actually an interesting place after moving away from it. My parents old house and their new one is in the middle of suburban land-of-strip-malls LA. And that will always be part of what LA is to me. But there are so many neighborhoods, these little creative universes within the giant smog-swirled multiverse of LA. Like on this last trip, we ended up visiting Silver Lake, Chinatown, DTLA Arts District, Little Tokyo, Los Feliz, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Hollyhock House, and multiple tasty Chinese restaurants in the valley.
But really the best part of our trip was just being home in my parents house. The place is a literal time capsule from the early 90’s to today. My mom doesn’t throw away a thing. It could be bittersweet journey down memory lane. Seeing my sketch books and pencil cases from elementary school brings back happy memories. Photos from our family road trips make me chuckle. But seeing my old high school yearbook makes me cringe as the four most awkward, ragey, hormonal years of my life flashed into mind. I kicked it under my bed.
Most days, we lounge in my parents backyard in the shaded patio. It’s 85 degrees and Ellie helps to water the plants, which involves her dumping buckets of water on herself. We pick ripe oranges and kumquats from my moms trees and snack on them all day. I knit or read, Ellie plays with the huge array of sidewalk toys that my mom has amassed in the short time since becoming in a grandparent. Slow days where nothing important is accomplished but we feel so good about it nonetheless.
milkywaypicnic 