 | edt4 (99)
06/27/2007 |  I love California and used to visit it yearly. I think it's one of the most beautiful places on earth, but I never for a moment thought about moving there to live. I never experienced an earthquake, or a mudslide, or a rampaging fire that threatens to destroy not just my home but my entire neighborhood, or cultish mass murderers, or Arnold Schwarzenegger as Governor, and I never want to. In NJ, all I've ever had to face are corrupt politicians and toxic waste. But, I must say, I miss California (I had friends who lived there; they've since returned to the East Coast). The ride up the Pacific Coast Highway from San Diego to San Francisco was one of the most exquisite things I've ever done, and I can't recommend it enough. San Francisco is one of the most gorgeous cities on earth, quite frankly. Los Angeles is not quite so gorgeous, but its kitsch appeal can't be denied. Sunset Boulevard, as I remember it, had some surprisingly good book stores and movie-material stores, and, as a cemetery buff, California has some of the best in the U.S. Humphrey Bogart, Marilyn Monroe, Tyrone Power, Bugsy Siegel, Alfalfa Switzer, Spencer Tracy, Curly Howard, Lou Costello, Bela Lugosi, Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, Clara Bow, W.C. Fields, Clark Gable, Stan Laurel, Charles Laughton, George Raft...they're all buried out there, and the California cemeteries are memorably lovely in their own unique and extravagant way. To sum it up-- so far as residency goes, I'll stay on the East Coast, thank you. NY has the best and the worst of everything. I haven't been all over the world, but I've traveled fairly extensively, and I have yet to encounter anything that matched the best that NY has to offer. The East Coast also has the change of seasons to offer (I'm getting to a point where I hate winter, but fall is my favorite season), and New England, and enough variety of a positive nature to keep me centered here. Still, I seriously miss visiting California and hope to return in the not-too-distant future. I'll return, that is, as long as that final cataclysmic earthquake hasn't struck and turned Arizona into oceanfront property.
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