“Be careful of the roads here, they can buckle beneath you at any time.”

I’m driving through Hollywood with my friend Enos. We speed over a fracture in the road and shift slightly in our seats. I look back at the giant crack and assume it got there as a result of an earthquake. Oh well, I think.  It’s my second day in town and I am feeling this city, cracks and all. I came here on an inspiration vacation and so far, it’s been entirely successful.

The night before I’d met up with my friend and writing partner Ayma, who’s joined me on this trip, and gone on a platonic double date with two strangers – an aspiring actor named Austin and his gym buddy Matt, who’s a writer for a magazine I had wanted to pitch. Synergy!

Ayma had met the aspiring actor’s dad in first class on her stopover flight to Phoenix, enroute to LA. He’s the CEO of a jewellery company and was taken by Ayma’s giant eyes and infectious charm. They talked about inspiration, aspiration and success – the things Ayma is coming to find on her trip to LA. He shares a valuable lesson he learned on a similar journey to get where he is today: the only difference between anxiety and excitement is the outcome you predict. Then, the CEO called up his son in LA and told him to take Ayma out. Which is what he does the next night.

Austin admits that his dad tries to set him up with random girls he meets all the time, but this is the first time the girl has followed through. We go to a vegan restaurant named Green Leaves, which is unimaginative save for the pink vintage guitars randomly hung on the walls.  We get over our awkwardness quickly and talk about the city and its endless opportunities. Matt gives me pointers on pitching to the magazine he writes for and we exchange email addresses. I go home feeling excited, which is what I’d initially come here to feel.

In LA, people are outwardly friendly. Men notice you and smile when you walk into a room. Everyone is working on an exciting project. Everyone is working towards something. Strangers seem to want to help you out. I’m addicted to the feeling of possibility and I know this city can feed that.

*

After Enos’ warning, I keep noticing cracks in the infrastructure. On the sidewalks, on the roads and even on the freeways.  These sinister gaps are everywhere. Sometimes the street is so unlevelled, it’s slanted half a foot above the rest of the concrete. I wonder why the city doesn’t put more effort into fixing these cracks, and how often people trip on this crumbling infrastructure, break a limb and sue. Or maybe natives to this city don’t even notice them anymore.

*

I am staying with Enos in his beautiful guesthouse, which is surrounded by lemon trees. I had originally come to spend time with his boyfriend, who is my best friend. But as Murphy’s Law would have it, his boyfriend is in Vancouver, working on a gig, staying at my apartment. Regardless, Enos is like my family and he treats me like so. He is not afraid to tell me like it is. In my time spent with Enos, he continues to lose his patience with me, with my constant moods, with my negative outlook on life. He wants me to go out and experience LA, while I want to lie under the lemon tree and write. I tell him it’s hard to change my moods but I’m working on it—I have been for the last year. Apparently I’m not working on it fast enough, because he continues to weigh in on me and I begin to crack. I begin to crumble.

*

It is my second last night in LA. Ayma and I are out with her new friends, as her unflappably cheery demeanour and openness never fail to attract people to her, particularly awe-inspired men. We are at an overly crowded bar and Ayma’s new friends are asking me what I want to drink. I tell them I don’t drink but they keep pressing.

“Why not just for tonight?”

I am burnt out and irritated and majorly hormonal. I am in a mood. A mood I am very familiar with. A mood that is hard to fight.

These new friends try to talk to me, eagerly tell me I should give them my email address. I barely spit out one-word answers and slouch in a corner, visibly miserable. I remember what Enos, who’s lived in LA for six months and continues to master this town, told me the first night I got in: In Los Angeles, you always have to be on.

Okay then. I am failing miserably in this town.

I try to play a mood altering exercise with myself where I have to list five things that make me happy about the situation I am in. I look around the crowded bar, at Ayma’s new friends slinging back their drinks, clamouring to shower her with attention, and want to cry. There is nothing here that makes me happy and I hate myself for feeling this way. I truly hate myself.

*

I wake up the next morning feeling lower than I have in a long time. I feel completely depleted. My head is light and spacey and inside I feel black.

I’d come to LA to be inspired and I was about to leave feeling like a failure.

I choose to be kind to myself and spend the rest of the day lying under the lemon trees, napping, drinking water, and eating fruit. Ayma comes over and we do a bit of writing. I slowly ease back into myself. In the evening, we eat at a healthy restaurant called Tender Greens, point out names we recognize on the Walk of Fame and take photos in a photo booth. By night time, I feel okay again. Not quite inspired, but not quite eroded either.

*

Enos’ assistant arrives early the next morning to take me to the airport. We speed along the freeway, zipping over cracks in the Los Angeles infrastructure. Again, I imagine how they got there and how long it will take for them to be covered up. Or maybe, I wonder, they will just continue to crumble and eventually turn into something far worse.