Topsy Turvy
Ten days in Los Angeles – primarily Venice Beach – is food for the soul. For mine, anyway. I’ve met family, spent time with a few old friends and made some new, interesting acquaintances. Most importantly, there’s been adequate time for well-needed introspection. On life in general and more specifically on what I should focus on creatively henceforth. What will propel and satisfy me into the next phase? Where will the next challenges come from?
Change is good. Challenges are better.
It’s soon time for new endeavors. Geographically and artistically. This is precisely what I’ve been contemplating/pondering whilst surfing, running or shooting under the California sun.
Through an unforeseen but nonetheless fortunate chain of events, I met a couple of inspiring fellows during morning coffee at Cow’s End; Larry, a photographer and visual artist and Roy, a short story film director and writer. I met both just after my arrival to L.A., which in itself made the trip worthwhile. Creatively speaking, that is.
Roy and I had actually met during last year’s visit. This time, he introduced me to Larry who had also just recently finished a book project about Vietnam and could fully relate to the creative void I’ve been experiencing following the publication of the book about Malmö Opera.
During a few walks along Venice Pier, Larry and I spoke at great length about this conundrum and other related topics and Larry gave me (perhaps inadvertently) the intellectual push I needed to pursue a relatively new path I’d been feeling somewhat anxious about.
The photo above is the Airbus 380 I flew with from LAX to Frankfurt. The ride over continental USA and then across the north Atlantic was extremely bumpy and sleep was sporadic at best.
Frankfurt is one of the most confusing airports I’ve ever had the displeasure of visiting. The often unclear and therefore misleading signage and lack of manned information stations almost caused me to miss my connecting flight to Copenhagen.
Okay, so I was tired after the turbulent eleven hour flight. But never before have I had to pass through three different passport control stations during an hour long stopover!
Surprisingly, the security and checkin process at LAX was, if not exactly pleasant, than at least painlessly smooth.
The Tom Bradley Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport is hopefully going to be used as a benchmark when airports like JFK and Newark one day decide to modernize.
It’s going to be interesting to see how long this trip’s jet lag lasts…so far, it’s pretty much topsy turvy.