California is also, however, the site of real people's homes. Real people's lives. Real lives begun as dreams and perhaps dribbled into boredom. Or unraveled into nightmares. Or fabulously, miraculously achieved. This schism - between what California represents in popular imagination and what it is, what it means to live there, to be from there - means Californians collide constantly with the rupture of existence.

How to dream the life we are already living.

Now that she is free, she is in New York to raise funds for victims of trafficking still in captivity. Whether for tsunami victims or child brides, fund-raisers always seem to me like a necessary evil. A performance for the powerful.

On this occasion she surveys the catered spread from the top of Trffieca, nearly eye-level with the lofty tip of the Freedom Tower. She finds the buffet choices distasteful, and whispers softly, "Everything looks uncooked. So far in America, I only like the Mexican fried shrimp." She serves herself a few grapes and a piece of cheese. The austere gaping space, adorned with a few select prints notable for their rarity, has an air of isolation meant to Ire envied. One that penetrates her in the most unenviable way.

She stands off to the side as the guests gather. A nouveau riche, cultured, socially conscious crowd—people for whom an invitation to such events is an increasingly necessary symbol of status. The type of crowd that admires both the Fendi Casa coffee table and the copy of "Guerrilla Warfare" conspicuously lying on it.

They come bearing their power, ready for the one transaction (via tax-deductible gift) they are happy to conduct themselves. They will defer to her pain, and demand inspiration from it.