If California annexed Saipan

When I was a teenager and moved to California from the grim flatland of Illinois, I envisioned the golden state as a real life beer commercial or Frankie Avalon movie, with beauties frolicking on the beach while the sunset was toasted with icy Corona beers and bonfire parties raged on into the warm night.

Reality in California was far different. There were seemingly more cops than beach bunnies prowling the sands sometimes, and even a benign and well-behaved get together of my high school chums and I was clouded by the threat of a run-in with officialdom.

If California owned Saipan, what passes for normal afternoon activity here would be a rolling list of misdemeanors.

Park your truck on the beach? In California, it would be towed and cost you a couple of hundreds bucks to spring from officialdom’s grubby clutches. You, meanwhile, would quite likely be in the hoosgow.

Have a campfire at the beach? Oh, dude (as they say in California), heavy fines for that–running in the hundreds of dollars, unless you happen to find a state approved, concrete fire pit constructed just for the purpose. These are located three inches from the other state approved, concrete fire pits, giving your barbeque all the charm and elbow room of Los Angeles rush hour gridlock.

Pop a brewski open at the beach? You’d have to be nuts. They’ll nail you for that.

Okay, so you decide not to park your pickup truck on the beach, not to have a fire there, not to have a beer there, and your bonfire party will be reduced to nothing more hedonic than star gazing by the surf.

Sorry, pal. In many–if not most–places, that’s illegal too. Yes, the beaches have a curfew, and it’s a common sight to see helicopter and ground teams from the police teaming up to sweep the beach of Criminal Star Gazers who are violating The Curfew.

Some (not all, but certainly enough to notice) Californians are an odd bunch. They flee the bureaucratic mess they’ve created, then insist on rebuilding it brick by brick wherever they go. They’re absolutely rabid for rules and regulations, frothing at the mouth with platitudes and “we oughta’ have a law about this…”

No news, this, to folks in Colorado, Nevada, Washington, and other western states that have absorbed an influx of California yuppies. Many of these California refugees have proceeded with ant-like determination to lobby for zoning laws, fencing laws, and a bunch of other laws aimed at turning formally semi-rural areas into Encino-style homogeneous hells.

Middle-American yuppie angst can’t sit still, and the lives of quiet desperation some people live are tethered to invisible clouds of floating anger and jealousy. If they encounter sounder souls or freer spirits, they freak out, and will try to rain their misery upon any nearby targets.

Drive to Pau-Pau for the afternoon? Take your family and friends to the beach for a barbeque? Have a sea-side fiesta? Teach your kids how to fish (without some kind of a license)? Enjoy it here, because if Saipan was California, it would all be illegal.