California Memories
Written on May 15, 2026
California is only one of the 50 states in the United States, but it's the one with the largest population, and it's the third-largest state in land area. I've already spent far more time in California than I care to remember.
The way things are in the state today makes me want to avoid it altogether. There's homelessness and high taxes among many other distasteful things I won't mention.
My history with California began with a trip to visit my maternal grandmother in Fremont, when I was too young to remember details. I can barely remember my grandmother.
Although I have clearer memories of most of the time I spent in California after I became an adult, I obviously can't remember everything.
My First Few Military Years in California
I attended United States Marine Corps basic training at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego. I turned 18 a couple of weeks before graduating. After graduation, I was sent to my class "A" school at the 21 area of Camp Pendleton, near Oceanside.
After I graduated from that school, I was transferred back to the Marine Corps Recruit Depot as a member of the permanent personnel. I eventually ended up at Casual Company, Headquarters Battalion.
That unit was responsible for the military personnel at the alcohol rehab center, the drug rehab center, some specialized education programs, and for processing Vietnam era deserters after they were pardoned by President Carter in 1977.
I was single back then, so I lived in the barracks on base. My off-duty hours would be incredibly boring if I didn't find things to do. This was years before home computers became commonplace, and even more years before the Internet became available to consumers.
I played video games at a mini-arcade in the bowling alley on base during the week, and at larger arcades in downtown San Diego on weekends, but not every weekend. There were enough movie theaters, including drive-ins, that I could usually find something to watch a couple of times a month.
When all else failed, and when I was broke, I would spend my time at the base library. There were other places I went, but not regularly. I visited Ocean Beach, Mission Beach, and Pacific Beach, as well as Presidio Park in a neighborhood called Old Town.
Trips from Arizona to California
A few years later, I was married and stationed in Yuma, Arizona. My wife, Josie, was pregnant with our second child. She started craving "Indian" mangoes, which weren't available in Yuma.
It took me more than three hours to drive to the commissary at a Navy base in San Diego. When we found out they were out of stock, Josie bought some other fruit that we couldn't get in Yuma, so it wasn't a complete waste of a trip.
Several years later, while I was assigned to the recruiting station in Phoenix, Arizona, I had to make several trips to California. I went to the recruiting district headquarters twice after it was relocated to the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego.
During one long Independence Day weekend, I took my family to Disneyland in Anaheim. That was a mistake because we ended up spending more time standing in lines than anything else. It was a mistake I never repeated.
My Last Military Years in California
For my last two years in the Marine Corps, I was assigned to the Marine Corps Logistics Base in Barstow, California. I didn't want to move my family, so I lived as a geographical bachelor in the barracks. It was a six-hour drive, one-way, from Barstow to Phoenix, so I didn't go home often.
By that time, I had a crappy, yet expensive desktop computer and a dial-up Internet connection. I stayed on base and kept myself occupied with Internet activities until the day I traveled to Phoenix for the last time.
There were a few times when I went to places with the people who worked for me. We went to two studios, Warner Bros. in Burbank, and Paramount in Los Angeles, to participate in studio audiences (we made money for the MWR services on base). We also went to a couple of pizza places in Victorville.
After Retirement From the Military
After I retired and before I moved to the Philippines, my family took a few trips to Los Angeles. We stayed at the apartment of a great uncle (called "lolo" in Tagalog) in an old hotel on Wilshire Boulevard once, and later at a house near Sunset Boulevard.
We once visited one of Josie's cousins in Huntington Beach and a couple of her other cousins in National City. The most recent trip to California was to visit my older son and his wife, who was stationed with the Air Force near Sacramento.
Although I try to follow the "never say never" rule, I don't think I'll be returning to California ever again. Unless I'm flying through its airports, naturally.
Image by TUBS, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons