Does anyone work?

My son and I went to the pool in this apartment complex, which feels more like a hotel in Vegas than a family residence in the middle of LA. The water was appropriately azure in color, inviting my little boy to get in despite the cool temperature. There's nothing significant about any of this except the fact that the pool was crowded at 3:00 in the afternoon on a Thursday. Each lounge chair was occupied, a female or male form splayed out, their bodies turned toward the receding afternoon sun. The only thing I could think as I looked around was, 'what are they all doing here in the middle of the day. And why don't they have jobs?' It's a thought I've had often as I drove past a Starbucks, the outside tables full of able bodied men and women sitting, drinking, conversing, all quite leisurely, none of them dressed as if they were coming or going to work. This culture of leisure manifests in movie theaters being nearly full for an 11:00 AM showing, middle level executives going to work dressed as if playing a round of golf instead of conducting business, and men and women going to work dressed much like a twenty year old in designer jeans (purposely faded by the Designer) and a t-shirt emblazoned with some rock band's logos.

My book club has been reading the memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert, "Eat, Pray, Love." The book is a good romp, but the interesting thing that has given me something to contemplate is how she asserts that every city can be summed up in one word. For instance, Rome's word, one of the cities that she visits, is Sex. We can surmise that the word for Washington, DC is Power. Gilbert asserts that the word for New York City, where she lives, is Achieve, whereas the word for LA is Succeed. I thought about the differentiation of these two words: achieve and succeed. The dictionary defines achieve as: to perform or carry out with success; to accomplish something desired or intended. It also defines succeed as: to come next in time or succession; to follow after another; replace another in an office or a position. These two words chosen by Gilbert is so appropriate for the two cities, both places obsessed with success, with winning. Yet, how different the tempos, the drives behind each to reach this desired result.

In New York, everyone has the appearance, real or a pretension, of being busy, of moving quickly toward the next spot on their board game. When one thinks about New York, I see people walking, moving, all in constant motion toward their destination. In LA, it is the opposite since this sense of leisure, of time being elastic, is the epitome of success, where the appearance of doing very little--even if a pretense--is the measure of how successful you are. Hence, the ease with which all of the residents of the Palazzo can sit, or rather, lounge around in the middle of the day without any anxiety about missing some opportunity to get to the next rung on whatever ladder they are trying to climb.

The dictionary definition for both words also signifies how one word is about moving forward toward a desired goal, whereas the other word is about waiting for that succession to be awarded to you for merely being next in line. The difference is significant, and manifests in many interesting paradoxes in both cities. I'm not passing judgment here, but I will say that my uber-Preppy, East Coast upbringing makes this idea of sitting around for "success," to be bestowed upon me by divine intervention, incredibly anxious. What? No drops of salty perspiration? No tears from complete exhaustion? How can that be? And if one is lucky enough, fortunate enough to be have reached your desired level of success...with so little effort, or so it appears, does that mean the success can just as easily be taken away?

I realized with this move to New York, I will have lived in all of the four major East Coast cities: Boston, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and New York City. And since I've lived in London, well, the only other place left for me dream about would be Paris. Isn't that part of the East Coast person's plight, if Achieve is our word, to always be looking ahead? So, I have yet to get to New York, but I'm already setting sights on a beautiful, small apartment on the Left Bank. I know, I know, it is insane and irrational. But then, well, we know sanity, rationality are not words easily associated with me.