Before I moved to Los Angeles, I was at a Verizon store in Stamford, CT. I was working out some issues with my cell phone bill (See: An iPhone…..Finally.) I was waiting in line for service and an old friend walked into the store. It was Mr. Baranowski. Now, I don’t know Mr. Baranowski’s first name off the top of my head, because I always remember him as a little league baseball coach. For years, I played baseball with or against his son, and at that young age every parent or coach was Mr. or Ms…
Mr. Baranowski remembered me and we caught up while waiting in line at Verizon. I let him know that I was into Photography and that I was about to move to Los Angeles really soon. He perked up and shared with me that he used to be a musician. What? Never saw that coming. He was quite the drummer back in the day and his band toured a lot through Canada and the west coast. His best piece of Los Angeles advice:
"Make sure you go to Zuma Beach."
Cool. I kept the name of the beach in the back of my mind, thinking, “okay, yeah, I’m sure I’ll get around to it.” Very non-commital.
But fast forward to Memorial Day weekend 2014. The weekend was approaching and my friend, Kelly Rothberger and I were trying to figure out some plans. Some friends suggested that we grab some food and have a picnic at the beach.
Which one should we go to…? Hmm, we could do Zuma...
Ding! My encounter with Mr. Baranowski jumped back to the front of my mind and I was all in. We packed up the car and made the trip to Malibu and had a great Memorial Day:
