Left With Everything

A note to the reader: I have met many wonderful people in Bakersfield, and although the town is not for me, the entire population of people aren’t all really to blame.

I was lost. I had almost got ran over for the millionth time by a speeding vehicle, and nothing but confusion flashed before my eyes. I couldn’t see the future even if I was a psychic who was asked to make a prediction with a gun held up to my head, and it genuinely bothered me. I always had a plan or something to build off of. I was always so sure of myself and where I would eventually end up, and then somewhere along the way, I lost myself.

Ever since that van narrowly missed my fragile human body I have been trying to figure out my future plans and focus in life. “What the f#ck do I do next?” And then it hit me. Not the van. The way my life was going on right now, was the guiding force that would lead me to the “next step on my journey.”

Having two or three quarters left at Cal Poly Pomona made me re-assess my schedule. I obviously had limited choices with what I had left to take before graduation. I also knew that living here, in the University apartments while doing so, with incredibly loud and horny young college goers would eventually drive me bankrupt and insane, and so I had some direction there.

I had also started thinking about the upcoming summer and how I really didn’t want to go back to my mom’s place, but moving out of here and staying in Southern California away from the putrid heat, the bowels of redneck suburbia, and the limited job opportunities this summer would be the biggest problem that I had on my mind though. I had no money, no job, and no way of just borrowing or asking for the money to rent a room. I realized that I was stuck in the, armpit of California, right next to a place called Oildale, in the one horse town called Bakersfield if I couldn’t find a way to stay out here, and then I also realized that finding a permanent job and/or grad school, would have to come soon and that I had to start making decisions.

All this made me move forward. If I wanted to stay out here in civilization I had to get money, which meant a job before room searching. If I wanted to write a novel later I needed a real job that would pay, and this made me incredibly determined to at least try and save myself from Bakersfield.

Talk from people who believe that I can’t do it, now drive me and make me want to prove them wrong, and living in civilization during the academic year, and having to be dragged back to the Central Valley, makes me want to do everything in my power to stay here on my own for the summer, and eventually also for the time after I graduate Cal Poly, and it all made me think back to the flash before my eyes—I was never left confused with nothing to go on—I was left with everything.