As the last vestiges of 2023 slip away, we find ourselves grateful for the journey and the incredible company we've had along the way—you, our cherished listeners. This episode is a tapestry of reflections, weaving the hopeful anticipation for a fresh year with the curious pattern of fortunes tied to the dance of the calendar. We journey back to '90s Los Angeles with LA Times' Metta Valentic, navigating through a nostalgic narrative filled with young love and cultural hotspots, a tale where personal growth and difficult choices echo the universal themes of chasing dreams and asserting one's independence.
Our second moment of introspection brings the odyssey of relocating to the City of Angels into focus, capturing the essence of a life transition without the convenience of a car and the emotional adieu to a beloved Hollywood abode. As we step into North Hollywood, the episode becomes a mirror reflecting the importance of self-love and recognizing our own worth. It's with a heart full of gratitude that I send out New Year's Eve cheers, promising to carry this shared adventure into the stories and reflections of the year to come. So, sit back, pour yourself a celebratory drink, and let's toast to the memories and the miles we've yet to travel together.
As the last vestiges of 2023 slip away, we find ourselves grateful for the journey and the incredible company we've had along the way—you, our cherished listeners. This episode is a tapestry of reflections, weaving the hopeful anticipation for a fresh year with the curious pattern of fortunes tied to the dance of the calendar. We journey back to '90s Los Angeles with LA Times' Metta Valentic, navigating through a nostalgic narrative filled with young love and cultural hotspots, a tale where personal growth and difficult choices echo the universal themes of chasing dreams and asserting one's independence.
Our second moment of introspection brings the odyssey of relocating to the City of Angels into focus, capturing the essence of a life transition without the convenience of a car and the emotional adieu to a beloved Hollywood abode. As we step into North Hollywood, the episode becomes a mirror reflecting the importance of self-love and recognizing our own worth. It's with a heart full of gratitude that I send out New Year's Eve cheers, promising to carry this shared adventure into the stories and reflections of the year to come. So, sit back, pour yourself a celebratory drink, and let's toast to the memories and the miles we've yet to travel together.
Morning bitches and towns. If no one told you they love you today, then I love you because you're you and I'm on my podcast, morning Bitches, and it is December 31st, 2023. What a year. Let me just tell you. 2023 was not a good year for us. What 2024 will be? Usually odd years at the end aren't good, but even years are better.
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I wanted to read this. I love to read stuff from the LA Times, then we'll talk. Can we talk? Joan Rivers, one of the most brilliant comedians in the whole wide world? Who didn't love Joan Rivers? Right, right, of course. So this is by Metta Valentic.
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Dangerous attraction Going his bedroom with a snake was sexy at first. It couldn't last, right, of course. Right. When I read the news that Silver Lakes Cafe Tropical so many of us in LA went there, you know had abruptly closed, memories came flooding back, memories of a time, a place and a boyfriend. I met John at a dimly lit Las Fielas duplex at one of those friends of a friend parties I found myself frequenting during my first year in La La Land. He was tall and soft-spoken and had long brown hair that reminded me of Jim Morrison. His eyes wouldn't let me go and we were soon locked in the bathroom with John whispering o'etry of me among the candles and scoff draped lamps. He was a welder helping to build the Getty Center and I was accepted into the Director's Guild of America training program and apprentice. That placed me on TV and film shoots roughly two years.
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John wasn't my type, although at 22, my spotty dating history didn't exactly mean I knew my type. He kept a massive python named King in his bedroom Ivey. He told me without irony that he owned eight guns that he disassembled and hid throughout his Silver Lake bungalow. Our attraction was intense. The sex tinged with an air of danger. John introduced me to Los Angeles. Silver Lake and Las Fielas were our playground.
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He grew up in Los Fielas. I lived there from 1980 on. We started every Sunday with Cafe Con Leche and Guava Pastries at Cafe Tropical. We caught films at the Vista and drank at the Smog Cutter. I don't know that place. John took me to sweaty punk shows at Space Land. Our late nights always ended at the ranch and old school Hollywood house behind the old Albertsons at Melrose Avenue in Vine Chock, full of John's hard partying buddies.
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John was light years away from my stuffy East Coast upbringing and liberal arts college friends. I fancied us as two characters in the Beast Boys video, especially when we dressed up and had date night at Netty's on Silver Lake Boulevard. This guy knows just what to do, or he knew that part of LA in the mid-90s was its own ecosystem. Swingers was about to turn my neighborhood into a hipster haven, but before that you could rent a two bedroom on Las Fielas Boulevard for a steal. True, my first apartment was $200. An Alexandria in Las Fielas. Oh, I used the Thomas Guide to Learn LA sprawling streets, but John was my guide to everything else I would eat, where to drink and how to find a community in this fragmented city.
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John actually grew up in LA. He regaled me with tales of living in downtown lofts where he used to shoot rats in the alley from his window. How interesting. One night he took me to a rave on deserted stretch of Jefferson Boulevard where we danced inside a massive warehouse among twisted metal sculptures. He also insisted I couldn't live in Los Angeles without driving Mohal and driving its entirety. So we spent all day in his Bronco, dodging motorcycles and tourists, savoring the views on each side.
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Both my apprenticeship and my relationship with John grew more serious, creating tension in my life Working on set. Every moment of my free time he brushed aside any efforts to see my friends. We always ended up with his at the ranch. Although I appreciated getting to know both the iconic and hidden parts of LA with John, I chafed under his control. Soon we were at a breaking point. John and I fought more than we didn't. His poetry turned into rancid sharing a bedroom with a snake stopping. Sexy Nights at the ranch lost their rockalore, like someone suddenly turned on the lights at closing time. John gave me grief about my schedule, implying that I was ignoring him in favor of my career. What's wrong with that? Right?
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I graduated from my production training program and was offered a plum position on film. That was supposed to be the next big thing. Despite my outward success, I was confused, burned out and needed space to clear my head. Something had to give. When my best friend from college called and said she was going to spend the summer union organizing service workers in rural Ohio, I saw my opening. I turned down the film, broke up with John and hightailed it out of town. I paused my LA dreams for a few months, getting the time and distance I needed to get over John and recommit to my career. Good for you, girl. Right when I got back in August I said about rewriting my LA story.
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At the Dresden, at the house of Pauys and in the winding trails by Griffith Observatory, I carved out a career I wanted. I met my husband on set and have a daughter who's discovering her own city. Once the young of me swore I'd never lived west of a La Brea, and now the older me lives in Culver City and rarely gets back to Silver Lake or Los Angeles. The area has changed and so have I. My memories of that time and place are bittersweet. I miss the guava pastries at Cafe Trafical. I miss my early 20s and miss the endless promise of a night out in LA. I don't miss John, but I have one regret turning down the job on the next big thing a little film called Boogie Nights Wow, thank you.
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The author is an assistant director, producer for television and films and she lives in Culver City and is writing her second novel. She's on Instagram at medieval underscore LA. Well, you know your TikTok Bobby loves LA because I moved here in 1976. I had an opportunity when I was a cabaret singer to sing at a cabaret that was opening with called the Tope At the End on La Cienica. It's now a strip joint, I think, but of course right. But it was amazing back in 1976. It was a dream coming out here. It was a paradise. Now paradise is lost as far as I'm concerned.
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The LA that I came to here in 1976, that I said I'd never go back to New York which I go back to New York to visit family and so forth and so on is no more. The LA where you can walk across the street in a crosswalk and people would stop. The LA where people smile at you how are you have a nice day? Where you're from, is gone. The LA without bars on the window is no longer here. The LA that was so clean when I moved out here you could eat off of the sidewalk because everything was always clean that LA is no longer here. That LA is, in my mind, beautiful, incredible, fabulous.
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I didn't have a car when I moved here, but eventually I got a car, thank God, because you need a car in LA. I took the bus, you know, or had a bicycle, but I didn't own a car when I finally owned a car. So this is my swan song to LA, because I love LA. I'm still here, but I'm at me. My husband.
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We moved to North Hollywood after we sold our mansion in Hollywood. It was a mansion, let me tell you something, but all things change. Nothing stays the same. So this is, you know, my podcast 1231 23, because I love you all and you know that that is the truth, that you all mean so much to me for listening to my podcast for the last year and hopefully it will continue in 2024. Of course it's going to continue. I'm still around, that's right. Your TikTok Bobby is still around and loves all of you so very much. And if nobody told you they love you today, then I love you because you are you. Who else are you going to be? Tell me who else. You could only be yourself and love yourself, no matter what people say. Love your self. So, tiktok Bobby, signing off today, have a fabulous New Year's Eve. Gag is into hay Morning bitches and talk Bye.