The city that I live in.

La Habra, California is a city with more Pitbulls than people and a liquor store on every corner. When I came back almost two years ago, it was the first time I had lived here in almost ten years. The city covers 3.376 square miles and has a little over 60,000 people. It is in the Northwestern corner of Orange County, which means I can pretend I’m Orange County cool without being Orange County ditsy.

It is hard for me to be grateful about the city that I live in since I have been trying to get out of it since I was 18 years old. Don’t get me wrong, there are way worse places to live, and La Habra did provide me with an education that was good enough to get me to a good college. The city provided me with my first job shelving books, but most of the people who live here grew up here, they work here, and they will die here….and they are perfectly okay with that.

I feel like a caged bird here. I am a flamingo in a flock of pigeons here.

While that seems to go against showing my gratitude for the city, I am in fact grateful. If it was not for the caged feeling that this city gives me, I would never have gone away to college, never moved to San Diego, and never ended up in Scotland.

Everything for me always comes back to Scotland. Scotland is the one place that I could see myself living for more than 3 years, and the one place that I really felt at home. I might never have gotten to Scotland had it not been for La Habra. My wanderlust has taken me far outside of the city limits, and has exposed me to so many great places and so many great people. I am grateful for La Habra for showing me the type of life I want to lead, and the type of place I want to live, and for being full of students that I can help with grammar and writing until I can get back there .