Retracing My Steps

About four months late, I finally hunkered down and started tackling my 2010 taxes so I can file them before the deadline of my six-month extension. Although my taxes seem to be annually complicated ever since 2001 when I won a game show and got laid off, last year was particularly complicated considering the amount of traveling I did back and forth from NY to LA to try to find (either freelance or fulltime) work.

Going through my receipts - especially my travel-related ones - was like reexperiencing the entire year in one night. It was a tough year, but I was happy when I was in California, which was a lot.

Tonight, logging all of my expenses, from hotels to car rentals to food and drinks, I retraced the steps that brought me here to California to stay: my first trip to LA with Edith before touring California City for Obscura Day in March, my first stint housesitting in May (and the subsequent weekend holiday at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs), my stint catsitting for two weeks over the Fourth of July holiday, finding any excuse to return, procuring oddball crashpads and never wanting to leave...

Those were happy times, losing weight, spending money I didn't have, meeting people, trying to find love, trying to find myself...

Last year, I had a sense that I was on a mission, on a path to something, somewhere, but I just had no idea what or where it was.

This year, I am certain I am supposed to be here, where I am, in LA. I still don't really know why.

I found a job. (Actually, so far, three jobs.)

I still haven't found a love that loves me back.

I still haven't found myself.

Maybe next year, as I account the financial traces of where I've been and what I've done in 2011, I'll be able to piece some more of it together.

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