I live in a place of beginnings. Santa Barbara. Ventura. Oxnard. Names that feel small on a map but heavy when you know what’s been born here. Patagonia was dreamed up here. Deckers grew into a giant here. Reef sandals, Toad&Co, even Avasol sunscreen. It all started between the cliffs and the ocean, in garages and small shops, in the hands of people who wanted more than just a paycheck. They wanted to live differently.
Everywhere I turn, there’s a story about someone who caught a wave or stitched a jacket and unknowingly created a movement. They weren’t just selling things. They were selling a way of being in the world… barefoot, salt-stained, chasing freedom. They were saying, this is what life can look like.
And sometimes, that truth lands like a gift. I feel it in my chest when I’m driving my van down the PCH, staring at the ocean like it might hand me the answer. I think, if they could start here, then maybe so can I. Maybe I don’t have to wait for perfect conditions. Maybe I just have to start.
Other times, it cuts me. Living in the shadow of so many firsts can feel like walking through a museum where everyone else’s work is on display but mine. I wonder if I’m already behind. If my chance passed while I was too tangled in my own storms. addiction, heartbreak, starting over in the shell of a van. I think about all the time I lost to chaos. And it hurts to imagine that my beginning might never measure up to the weight of the ones around me.
But lately, I’ve been realizing beginnings don’t always look like companies or empires. Sometimes they’re quieter, less polished. Sometimes a beginning is just writing something down instead of bottling it up. Or choosing not to drink when the voice in my head tells me I deserve to numb out. Sometimes a beginning is pulling paint across a canvas on the floor of a van, not knowing if it will matter to anyone but me.
And maybe that’s the kind of beginning I want. Not to be the next Patagonia. Not to stamp my name on fleece or boots. But to create a life that feels like mine, fully. A life where my work is honest, where my days don’t feel wasted, where I can wake up and say… this is it. This is the life I wanted to live.
Being here has shown me that beginnings don’t have to be loud or perfect. They just have to be claimed. All those legends started with someone choosing to try. That’s the thread I can follow. My own beginning doesn’t need a logo. It just needs me to keep showing up, keep writing, keep trying, even when the ocean of history around me feels overwhelming.
Because maybe what I want isn’t to outshine the people who came before. Maybe what I want is to stand beside them. Not in comparison, but in kinship. To say: I was here too. I started something too. And even if it only matters to a handful of people, or just to me, that’s enough.
So where do I begin? Right here. Again and again. Until one day I look up and realize my beginning has already become the life I was searching for.