I love the ocean. The salty Pacific runs in my veins. So this time when making the conscious choice to drive East into the desert and away from her shores it felt different. Strange it wasn't that I wasn't coming back, it was just this idea that I couldn't see her everyday.

Two days I spent with her, one on my way to Laguna Niguel and the home of the Pham family and the other after my workshop in La Habra, were filled with beauty. On the first day I stopped at Seal Beach where I put my feet in the water and watched the surfers. I drove to Balboa Island and walked around the whole place. I stopped to talk with people, and met a man named Joe. Joe was on the sidewalk in front of a house and we chatted about the weather. He asked me where I was from and I told him I was from the Bay Area but this was one of my first stops on my trip. He rented apartments on the island and said if it had been open that night he would've offered a place for me to stay.

I showed him the car I am traveling in and when he saw I had a basketball, he suggested we play. So the two of us went to the local court and shot hoops. He showed me a wall where he wanted a mural and talked about wanting it to be influenced by work that greatly inspired him, the work of Diego Rivera. I told him I would be back sometime and maybe then we could keep in touch and discuss further. Joe worked as an engineer on trains and an optician his whole life. It was great to meet him in this chance encounter of connecting and I thank him for being so generous and open and for playing some good basketball!

The howling sands of Long Beach met Connie and I after she brought me to La Habra and her school for a workshop, we set their and honored that city together for our friend J. We then drove down the coast line and ending up at Dana Point as the sun set. I kissed the sky and the ocean and her turbulent waters that somehow calm me. Holding that steady unsteadiness in my heart and letting salt dance in the air and cover me as the desert called.