What shapes the writing you’ll find here, and what gives it the impetus to emerge, are my two homes—North Carolina and California. Like James Taylor, when I am away from one of them, I travel to the other one in my mind. I carry with me the invaluable friends I have found in both those places everywhere I go. Periodically, the pets that have owned me on the opposite coasts of my country step out from behind the shrubbery in my brain to keep me sane. When I am confronted with the surly, often contemptuous, attitudes I find many individuals in each of these two states direct toward the other state, I feel like someone who has married into a family and doesn’t quite fit. I search for some kind of windshield wiper control. I want to clear the debris, so that one state can see the other as I do.
The truth is, I have never felt quite at home in California and when I return to North Carolina, I am not sure I belong there anymore. I long for Silicon Valley to become more neighborly and for North Carolina to embrace its multiculturalism—for heaven’s sake, even in my hometown you can find good Thai food now.
Like the clean air vehicle I am allowed to drive in the commuter lane, I have become some kind of hybrid: no longer exactly a Carolina girl, neither am I a California one. As I slowly integrate the better features of my two homes, in my mind, I’m going to Caro-fornia. As I make this journey, I am posting these thoughts, hoping you will be one of the kindred spirits that discovers them.
Julia Cline
I just finished framing a pastel painting of Hardpan and Tarmac sniffing the air at our back door. I am flooded with the feeling of them and their stories. Those were the halcyon days of cats and humans in our household. Four cats, two humans—there was plenty of time to enjoy each other.
Read MoreI find it ironic that my generation now harangues younger folks with tales of how we played.
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