I want to write something sentimental about Santa Cruz since I'm moving and all. Or on the other hand I'd like to write a letter to the town of Santa Cruz letting her know that she's really not nearly as great as she thinks she is. Maybe I'll dedicate a Streets song to her. Now wouldn't that be appropriately irreverent and yet perfectly childish? Maybe, since I'm drinking red bull, and I'm-well, quite frankly I'm avoiding the last part of the packing.

The final wrap up of the packing is the worst part. It's all the stuff that you might possibly need in the next few days. It's all the stuff that doesn't fit neatly into a little box (and believe me, I have a LOT of little boxes). I am not actually going to be moving into my house in Sacramento. I'll be taking my stuff there and then (unless I get a job, which I'm really hoping for) I will be living out of my back pack for a month doing sidework. Then, I'll be going to Japan because one of my amazing friends bought me a ticket out there to visit her.

Which brings me to another point. I have the most amazing friends a girl could ask for. I have no idea why they deal with me, but they do, and I consider myself an extremely lucky person. So I have amazing friends, I'm about to have a great summer with lots of adventure (the more the better, so if you have any ideas, please share), I'm about to hang out with and do some creative stuff with another really great friend, and I also have a degree from university now. So I guess now all I need is for Kristin Scott Thomas to stop denying our love for each other and move to Sacramento to make babies with me (Kristin, I'll gladly move to France with you if you're not up for the beauty of Sac).

So back to the sentiments about Santa Cruz. Let's see-where do I start? Well, Santa Cruz, I'm sure that you aren't worried about this, but just so you know-you have only one cab that works in the middle of the night. Making a plane sucks in your town. Also, I know you care about this: you have a LOT of seriously damaged people in your town, and you do a great job of being very kind to them. But quite frankly, I don't think catering to the damaged will make the world better. I am not saying that people are mean in Sac, because I don't think they are, but they aren't as oppressively nice as people in SC and that is why I can't wait to go where the damaged people aren't given voice in every arena of daily life. Besides, it's as though by giving the seriously damaged such a strong representative power, the other people who are better at hiding their broken-ness get to stay in hiding. I like the idea of everyone having to come out of that closet-but I won't cater to you if you do. Additionally, your bus system may be a decent system for such a small town, but I have to tell you right now: it stinks. For being such a "green" city, you make it awfully hard for people to avoid the use of cars in your town. Think about that.

Again, I doubt that Santa Cruz gives a shit about me, since quite frankly I don't really give a shit about Santa Cruz. It gladly took my money while I paid to live here and go to school, and it gladly jacked up prices during graduation week-end in order to get one last huge sum of money from us before we all move away from here to cities that we can afford to live in.

Additionally, I would like to discuss the topic of politics here in Santa Cruz. I was warned before I came here that it would be like living in a bubble of self-righteous radicalism. I was prepared for that, and thought to myself that for a couple of years it would be nice to live in that bubble. Unfortunately the only such radicalism I found here was in the "intellectuals" doing graduate work at the university-writing for the New Left Review (which is amazing, and I am quite aware that I will never write well enough for the New Left Review editors to even use my hard copy for recycled, reused toilet paper). I didn't find any radicalism outside of the city on the hill (the UC), and the radicalism there was minimal at best. So, Santa Cruz, you do live in a self-righteous bubble, but not one of radical politics. You live in the bubble of belief that you are radical, when for all intents and purposes you are nothing of the sort. I once saw a bunch of washed up hippies walking down pacific avenue burning little candles as a protest to the war. I was wondering who they were really protesting when it occurred to me that what they were really doing was marching down the street holding candles in order to congratulate themselves for being so forward thinking. Way to go Santa Cruz.

On the other hand, Santa Cruz offers some beautiful weather-and let me tell you I will miss desperately the morning fog, the smell of the ocean, the redwoods on my campus, the deer everywhere on my campus. I will miss the beauty here. Unfortunately, like everything beautiful in California, the people ruin it. Like Rufus says, "Life is the longest death in California".

I will also miss terribly going to school. I will miss having the context of a novel fed to me with an almost silver spoon (I mean, after all UCSC is a PUBLIC school). I will miss arguing about the context of a novel. I will miss learning about "intellectual history" which will always turn me on. I will miss reading Jameson, not understanding a word of it, and showing up to class to have it all explained to me. I will miss the gorgeous way a lot of my professors think and write. There is something magical and exciting to learn about the world in the thirteenth century from someone that has been extensively published on the subject, from an entirely new perspective-and this perspective is refreshingly holistic and just terribly exciting to hear someone lecture about. I will miss that luxury.

I am totally able to live the lifestyle of a "graduate" right now, thanks to friends who take very good care of me. I get to hang out for a month with a friend in Marin (I will be working, but won't have to do that whole tedious paying of bills and such) then I get to go to Japan-I know I already said this, but I'm sofa king excited about this. I will get to Okinawa a day before she arrives (she's coming from a small town in Japan that isn't on Okinawa) so anyway, I will be able to spend an entire day by myself wandering through a foreign city (I can't remember what city I'll be in) where I don't know a lick of the language, and then stay at a hotel- and I can't think of a better way to spend a day.

That's all. I hope this was sufficiently sentimental, as that is what I originally was going for. If not, then I guess you can join the damaged multitudes here in SC. They'll be really nice to you!