[Porsche-O-Phile]

I hear ya'. One thing I learned back in my flying days was that no matter where you land, you can ALWAYS find something to like about a place. By contrast, you can always find something to hate about a place too - it comes down to attitude. For all my grumblings about CA (particularly southern CA) I really AM trying to be objective about it. There are some wonderful things about living here. I love the sun. I love the palm trees and the beaches. I love being able to see the ocean and then turn around and see snow-capped mountains. Blue skies. Opportunity. A culture that values ENJOYING life. Being able to wear jeans to work without the pretentious stuffiness of, say, the east coast. A culture that values people on their contributions, rather than their "old money" connections or place in the good-old-boy network. All that is wonderful and liberating and led me to fall in love with this place.

But you also have to (objectively) admit that this state has changed - DRAMATICALLY - in the last five years. It's gone (and is still going) down the toilet at a horrifyingly fast (and accelerating) rate. Migrants and illegals are invading and taking over - turning once nice neighborhoods into ghettos that make Tiajuana look like a model society. The productive are being taxed into extinction. Businesses are being shuttered because it's simply not worth it to carry the deadweight here. Educated, skilled people are fleeing en masse only to be replaced by 20 uneducated immigrants all begging for a handout. The roads suck. The traffic sucks. It's impossible to get anywhere in under an hour. The housing is impossible to afford (even today). And the govenment... let's not even start. It's truly heartbreaking. Despite what y'all might think - I LOVE CA. More specifically - I love what it used to be. But to bury one's head in the sand and think it's still that way, or even that it might return to being that way anytime soon is just foolish. It's Paradise Lost. It breaks my heart. The toughest thing to stomach in this world is unrequited love or being "dumped". That's EXACTLY what I feel like with respect to my love for CA. I've loved this place for a decade and now it just flat doesn't care. It's "dumping" me.

Yes, I'm planning on joining the hundreds of thousands of other educated professional types in the "white flight" exodus from this state, but believe me - I will watch from afar and hope that someday maybe conditions will improve to the point it will be worth coming back. I'll always have a special place in my heart for CA, but given a choice of (1) staying on board the ship that's got a gaping hole in its side and is taking on water and listing 30 degrees to starboard, HOPING that maybe it'll make it or (2) getting in a lifeboat, rowing for shore and watching to see what happens, I'm doing #2.