Somewhere between catching up on Big Time Attic's blog in the small hours of this morning and hearing Marilyn say these words as we lay in bed before I took her to work, I realized that this is what I felt, too.

The entire time we lived in Minneapolis, my spirits were buoyed by the thought that we would eventually return to California and be near all of our old friends and my family again. We would be able to see the mountains again, I would have all of my roleplaying buddies nearby, Campaign would once again be an option, and well, you know, California has all of the best fast-food restaurants. But there's a lot we left behind.

Our apartment had a really nice view. Even though we lived near the heart of the city, our courtyard felt roomy and was always beautiful to look at, no matter the season. Sure, there was snow and sub-zero degree weather for a really long portion of the year, but the groundskeepers always shoveled and Minneapolis's indoor heating is unparalleled when compared to any other place I've ever lived. When it was warm enough, I could always go for a walk in the courtyard, or across the street to the park, or down to the corner shop where we sometimes would get ice cream. Maybe it sounds a little trivial, but I liked how our apartment was laid out, even if it was kind of small. I liked the way the sunlight made the computer desk look, with all of our old wedding decorations and pictures on top.

Our cost of living in Minneapolis was a lot cheaper than it is here in Los Angeles. Even when I wasn't working there, it never felt like the cold hand of doom was hovering over us - Marilyn's paycheck seemed to cover us okay. Even though there was your usual variety of office-related quirks that Marilyn would come home and talk about every day, at least the Minneapolis branch had activities. Sometimes they'd go out for drinks. Apparently, the Los Angeles branch does nothing, offers nothing, outside of the drumbeat of routine work.

I had a network of artists nearby, whom were either local or content to be local after school was finished. There was Zander's International Cartoonist Conspiracy group, the Comics program people at MCAD, FallCon and MicroCon at the State Fairgrounds every year, and of course, Pat and Doug up in North Branch. Even though I hadn't yet gotten a paying job in comics, the possibility of it seemed very real and immediate, waiting for me as soon as I was ready. And as long as I was a student, I'd have the resources and workspaces of the school right across the street. Before we left, one of my friends at MCAD even suggested that we get a studio together. I had, more or less, an established pattern of work habits in Minneapolis. When I couldn't focus on my work at home, I could always go across the street and become more focused.

We had a church to go to. Even though we never completely felt like we fit in - and to be honest, we did keep them at arm's length most of the time - it wasn't very far away and I found the sermons edifying. The option to become more involved in small groups, classes, or outreach programs, was always there. And when that wasn't enough, I knew exactly where to find the Christian talk radio station, where I could hear sermons from a wide range of pastors...and I knew when each one was on the air.

We knew our neighbor well enough to go over to her apartment and watch TiVoed shows and eat homemade rum balls, and were on good terms with our landlady because we'd been there so long. We had a parking space in the garage, so our truck wasn't exposed to the elements all the time, and while gas prices were pretty outrageous, we never had to drive very far in a week, anyway. We had expected that prices would be cheaper in California, but as it turns out, they're about the same. Our neighbors here in the apartment building, while nice enough, are amazingly...fragrant. I now understand to some degree the complaint, "I live above a Chinese restaurant." There's always a new and unpleasant smell filling the hallway between our doors - ranging from wet dog to wet dog on fire - which seeps into our apartment by the afternoon. And there's a young girl living over there who apparently communicates only through screaming and crying.

And, of course, the Twin Cities has the best games and comics shop I've ever seen, or, it seems, I'm ever likely to see. The libraries there are similarly unparalleled.

Marilyn and I both came to the conclusion that we were meant to return to Los Angeles. Intellectually, it seemed the correct decision to make, given the proximity of friends, family, and familiar places, as well as being close to the entertainment industry (which would ideally mean the possibility of storyboarding work, if comics work didn't present itself). We had prayed about it individually, and when we came together and finally shared our conclusion, it was the same.

Los Angeles presents a lot of new challenges that I suddenly don't feel prepared for. Many of them simply require me to establish good habits, a routine of activity that benefits me. Laziness and distraction face me at every turn, just as they did in Minneapolis, but I don't have the same solutions available to me that I did in our old home.

I don't think that our coming back here was a mistake; I think I need to make that clear. But I miss what was familiar and what was good about Minneapolis to the degree that I'm now willing to overlook the things about it that we didn't like. I think that my difficulty in adjusting to post-art school life is currently compounded by adjusting to living here. It would have been easy to get a part-time job back at Northwestern Bookstore to supplement Marilyn's paycheck, and even if I couldn't find work right away, I don't think things would feel as tight as they are now. I'm a little frustrated that I need to complete my current classwork in order to really have a complete portfolio to shop around, and that while I'm taking this independent study class, I feel I have the worst of two worlds: too much work to juggle a full-fledged professional comics job at the same time, but none of the work I'm doing now will pay me a penny.

If I'm honest with myself, I have to admit that most of my complaints at this point in time are problems with myself that I have to overcome. We aren't driving that much right now; to drive Marilyn to work is about the same distance as it was in Minneapolis. We have a lousy view from our apartment, but if I want to go for a walk, the park in Valley Village is within reasonable driving distance. And as much as I miss visiting Pat, it is good to have other friends that I haven't seen in years nearby. As for finding a church, I just need to get off my duff and start hunting around. We've had two invitations to visit churches our friends go to, and haven't yet done so.

I think the difficulty right now is just the transition. Things aren't as easy as they were in Minneapolis - for me, at least, if not for Marilyn - and I'm being forced out of the comfort zone I had developed around me. I have some serious sink-or-swim challenges before me, and I've been dragging my feet in facing up to them. It's difficult to keep from taking a "grass is greener" attitude.