California: Just a Short Flight From the US

My son decides he has enough of Minnesota winter and applies to the 'study abroad' program.  But instead of Europe he opts for the sunny coast of southern California. Well, California is very much like another country, and I jump at the chance to travel with him on his new adventure. We land in LA and spend the next couple of hours in a traffic jam. We are on a six-lane highway going north with so many other cars that it appears more like a parking lot. Where is everyone going?
Sam cranks up the radio in the rental car and gives us a quick run-down on west coast rap music.  Jon and I imagine we are in a movie, crawl past UCLA and the J. Paul Getty Center curling round the hillside above us. The highway divide is planted with banks of bougainvillea that is flowering all at once in magenta and red. But we can't get over the sky.  The brilliant blue expanse with not a cloud lets us know that we are not in Minnesota anymore.

 Our first real stop is Pismo Beach, as Sam is anxious to check out the beach.  We find miles of sand and old-fashioned cafes. There are small motels, camp grounds and trailer parks. This is definitely a holiday destination.  We meet retired people who have come to CA and stayed. There are cyclists doing the pacific highway, and families on RV holidays. It seems like everyone here as come from somewhere else.
We find the same at CalPoly when we unload Sam. There are plenty of foreign exchange students and those transferring. Everyone is looking to live the dream in California.
On the surface it is America, but with a difference. At Target, where we went to buy school supplies, I was surprised to find two whole aisles of wine similar to Europe.  Even Walmart had a pile of beer at its entrance. The Old Navy store looked like an old Mission, and everywhere the parking lots were full.

How the cattle and trees survived, I don't know. One local told us it hadn't rained in 10 years. "Not even in the spring?" we asked.  "What spring? We don't get spring".  The vineyards and fields of kale are all irrigated. But the hills look dry. No wonder there are fires nearby. Everything is different yet familiar. I realize that California is a mixture of all the places I have lived.  It is both dry, hot, beautiful, agricultural and a vacation destination all at once. I feel like I belong somehow, and I can see why others come and never leave.
As we progress through the weekend of sightseeing and campus orientation, I notice that we are the norm. Every other group of three is made up of parents like me with a college age son or daughter. I have never been the norm before.

We are all the same age.  Our children are all healthy intelligent young men or women. They look at us , and we at them, knowing that we are in same place in life, wanting the same things.
I sense my son wants to be off on his own, meeting those his own age. We say goodbye and head to the wineries. Jon is torn. He feels we should be spending these last few minutes with our son.  But instead we leave him with his group and make the most of our short stay in CA.
The next morning we walk down the beach to get some excellent coffee, just the two of us. We see other parents still with their child, wanting to see their child succeed on their own, but reluctant to say goodbye.