Morro Bay, a small tourist town on the coast of California. That’s where I lived for almost four years. That was the longest I’ve ever lived in one place. My parents had split up when I was two. I moved a lot between them. In Morro Bay I lived with my dad, and was close to most of the family on his side. Fourth grade, when I moved there, was when I met my best friend Ariel Zativa Beach. She was a fun friend and her parents thought it would be an awesome idea to make her middle name one letter off from a type of marijuana.

Ariel and I would always go downtown, the embarcadero as we called it. It was the main spot for people to hang out. There were stores of all kinds, game rooms and parks. The beach was also just a few minutes away. Our favorite place to go was a small, locally owned shop. It had all sorts of antiques, Japanese and Chinese swords, staffs, and throwing knives. The shop however also had figurines of fairies and dragons. There was a whole assortment of things and the first time we walked into that store we decided that, even if we could not buy anything, we would go into the store every time we were at the Embarcadero. That turned out to be almost every weekend for almost four years. A year after moving away from Morro Bay, to Berkeley Springs, I took a trip back there over summer. The first thing I did when I got back was go to Ariel. My dad, who I would be staying with for most of my time over there, gladly drove me to Ariel’s. Ariel and I went to our special little shop and looked around like nothing had changed. I haven’t been back to Morro bay for two years. However, I know that when I go back Ariel and I will go to that shop together just like old times. Just as if nothing changed.