The Duplex

I guess I didn’t have the guts to move to Los Angeles until about two years ago. I’m from Independence, Kansas, which is William Inge’s hometown, too. Inge, you might know, is the writer of the play Picnic. If you’ve seen the movie, you’ll have a general idea of what Independence looks and feels like (even though it wasn’t actually filmed there). And knowing that might possibly give you some insight into why moving to L.A. was such a huge step for me. It’s a whole other world.

Stepping off the train at Union Station, I thought my eyes were going to fall out of my head. The immensity, the cosmopolitanism of it all, took all the breath I could breathe. That’s around the time I also discovered its world-famous smog. But I didn’t care about that. There was too much to see. I wish I had had more time to just wander around and explore. I could have done that for weeks but instead I was forced to do that a little at a time. You see, when I arrived, I was just about to start a new job over in the Hollywood area at the law firm of Saxby, Jackson and Williams.