Stranger in a Strange Land - Arc 1

The first time we met, we were at a bar in L.A., where servers offered up plates of jalapeno mac & cheese and large goblets of wine.

Him: Tall, dapper, chisel-jawed, drinking pinot grigio. We spent the evening discussing design and typography, he in his Londoner's accent, me in my L.A.-speak.

Two days later, we had lunch and went to the traveling "Ashes & Snow" exhibit and talked about photography and Shigeru Ban. And for some shocking reason, he took a shine to me.

Nearly a year later, he rang me in New York. We met at a bar, where the kitchen was closing and the barkeep was tending to the night owls.

Him: Seated, bundled up, but still dapper and drinking pinot grigio. I had crossed the country. He had crossed an ocean. The U.S. was his new home.

We compared notes.

I had only been in town for a few months, but Los Angeles and New York seemed worlds apart, I said. While I was sincerely trying to create a home New York, I wondered what madness possessed me to leave my pretty good, fairly contented life in L.A.

It's not an adventure if there's no adversity, I concluded. Besides, the nomad in me had been aching for change. At least this was what I was telling myself.

As I listened to him talk about his own travails, I noticed that he was correcting himself in a conscious effort to adapt his vocabulary: People weren't bright, they were smart. Phone calls weren't made on a mobile, but a cell. He rode the elevator; he no longer took the lift.

However, he still pronounced the adjectival epithet "facking."

I smiled whenever it came up. I smiled a lot that evening.

He sighed.

His decision to come to the States was carefully considered, he told me. And when he left the city he'd called home for decades, someone very important was supposed to follow. But the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry, and they did in his case too.

The very important person is very much missed, and no number of round-trip jaunts could make up for not being in the same place all the time.

My life here is quite alright, he said. But I don't think I would have made the same decision had I known this would be the situation.

We drew a parallel.