Where the ships come in, before sailing out again

After being in the thick of insanity at Comic-Con for three days, going to Marina del Rey for a night was a welcome break. I arrived late on Sunday afternoon, after spending the morning in San Diego with friend Bonnie and then driving us both back to the Los Angeles area, dropping her off first at home, before setting off to find my friends Vic and Christine at their apartment in the marina, where they have been living for about the last three years. Neither is from there. Vic grew up in Indiana and then eventually moved to Virginia, which is where he met both Christine and me.

We walked to the beach, which is right down the street from their house, and we let Rennie run around like a crazy man, blowing off the steam he had accumulated all weekend, staying cooped up in the hotel room, save for the times I would break away from the conference to walk him around the park. There’s a pier that basically creates the border between Marina del Rey and Venice Beach, so we walked to the end of it, standing in the waning light with all the fishermen parked there, waiting to see if they would catch anything. Then one of the lines grew taut and it looked like the woman to whom it belonged had really got something huge.

“I hope it’s a shark,” Vic said, as we watched her struggle with the line.

But in the end, the hook had simply got caught up on the pier and had to be untangled.

We wandered into downtown, where crowds were gathering at the various watering holes and restaurants, and found an outdoor table at a cantina, where we could have Rennie at our feet and cold drinks in our hands. The tacos were okay but the company was better, and I heard about life in Los Angeles, a place that Christine said she never ever imagined she would live. Once she had decided to go to film school to learn about writing, though, it made sense to be there and then Vic was able to find a job at Investors Business Daily newspaper, thus staying in his journalism field.

It was different in LA. Manners were not the same. Driving distances between friends were huge. Traffic could be insane, not that either of their commutes are more than 10 minutes long. But it was a beautiful place to call home at the marina and they would continue to do so for at least two years, giving Vic time to finish studying for his Masters in business, which he is doing now, between hours at the paper.

Then what? Who knows? They’ll figure that out when they have to. In the meantime, they’ll just enjoy what they have. I mean, look at it. It’s gorgeous.