End of an Era

It’s the end of an era. Nick and I accepted an offer on our rental property next door. It’s been an emotional roller coaster here on Pass Avenue. Our kids are upset, our friends (tenants), Dave and Thomas are upset, Nick is upset and I cycle through phases of upset and excitement.

During the pandemic, I told Dave and Thomas, who have been renting the little cottage next door since 2007, that Nick and I were making our five-year plan which included buying a house back East and spending half of the year there. Nick wanted to “reduce our footprint” in California and I wanted to reduce my responsibilities as landlord and property owner. It only made sense to part with the rental house, including the pool we built at the back of that lot. It was an excruciating decision because Dave and Thomas have become family. And everybody but me hates to see the pool go.

When I say “cottage,” what I really mean is “shack,” the 750-square foot house built in 1935 and patched together in the decades since. The bathroom floor may collapse at any moment and all manner of things continue to break or wear out and Nick and I have no more enthusiasm for “fixing it up.” Poor Dave and Thomas have been so gracious about their duct-taped patio cover and glued-on shower soap holder. Nick has become a slum lord. When they told Nick the heater wasn’t working, he brought them a dirty space heater. 

Dave and Thomas were a literal Godsend. After buying the shack from our elderly neighbors in the fall of 2007, we added new plumbing and electric and spent a few weeks sprucing the place up. My goal was to turn it into a home I could be proud of, a place I would enjoy renting myself. We pulled up carpets and refinished the hardwood floors ourselves. We laid peel and stick vinyl tiles in the kitchen and bathroom, painted everything in sight, put up curtains. We installed a picket fence so a tenant could bring a dog. As a final flourish, I stuck two pink flamingos in the flower bed.

Lots of nice people showed an interest in renting. A single mom with a young child (a no-go since the house is really only a one-bedroom,) several young couples, single people and families. But a month went buy with no one signing on the dotted line. Finally, we met a guy who was ready to commit, but he wanted his girlfriend to come by the next day to give her thumbs up. I was uncomfortable with him for reasons I couldn’t express, (he did tell us he owned lots of guns) but was feeling pressure to get the house rented. When I went to bed that night, I gave God my worries, “God, we need to get this house rented but I’m just not sure about this guy. I put this dilemma in your hands. If we’re supposed to rent to him, help me have peace about it. Thy will, not mine be done.”

The girlfriend showed up the next morning and immediately put the kybosh on the deal. She thought it was too small and was irritated that we were keeping the back of the lot, including the old garage for our own use. A few hours later, while pulling into a parking space under a shade tree at Omar’s grade school for afternoon pickup, my phone rang. On the other end was a guy named Dave calling to ask about the house. Was it still available? Would we consider a dog? 

“Yes, absolutely,” I said. “We fenced in the yard because I remember when we were looking for a place to rent, our dog was part of the family.”

“My dog is very well-behaved,” Dave said. “Could I come over this evening and see the house and introduce you to her?”

“That would be great,” I said. “Is it just you and the dog?”

“No, and also my partner,” Dave said. I felt a little shock of pleasure.

“Partner???….Yeah!” I could picture it. I knew right then…

We met Dave, Thomas and Mama Dog a few hours later. When I unlocked the front door, and escorted them in, Thomas looked around the front room and, waving a hand toward the corner, said, “The Christmas tree can go right there…”

I said a little thank you to God. Thomas was someone who appreciated home when he saw it. I didn’t even need the rest of the hour sitting in the grass in the backyard getting to know Mama and her owners to know that these were our people. I think the pink flamingos did the trick. They took the house.

This post would turn into a novella if I tried to document all the wonderful, whacky, funny, crazy times that we’ve shared with our guys (I call them “the boys” even though they are now approaching middle age.) But here are a few:

Within the first few months of their occupancy, Dave and Thomas, enjoying a quiet night of watching television in their living room, heard a desperate howling scream coming from next door.

“Help! Oh my God, somebody help me!”

They both jumped into action, bursting out their front door, bounding over the two-foot-high block wall and running towards the screaming.

“Sweet Jesus, someone help me,” Nick was begging when Dave arrived at the bottom of the stairs leading to Nick’s mancave. Nick was holding up the end of a treadmill and Dave tried lifting to help ease the burden. Thomas stood behind for moral support.

“No!” Nick screamed. “The other way!” Nick’s thumbs were being smashed by the fold in the two hydraulic parts of the treadmill. 

By the time Dave released the pressure, Nick’s thumbs had deep grooves in the first joint. They sat in the living room, ashen-faced until both were able to recover from the shock. It took months for Nick to get feeling back in those thumbs.

“Wow,” his friend Loy said, “You were about to be ‘that guy with no thumbs.’”

A few weeks later, Halloween rolled around. The little cottage next door was covered in orange string lights, the door sported a bright fall leaf wreath, the porch was piled with hay bales and jack-o-lanterns. And a spooky witch cackled every time anyone approached the front window. Dave and Thomas had been planning their costumes for months — Dave as Robert Downey Jr. in Tropic Thunder and Thomas as The Pope. After winning first place at their local bar costume contest, they came back to hang with us. Dave drank whiskey with Nick. Chloe and her high school friends sat at Thomas’ feet while he regaled them with funny stories, waving a huge wine glass (which held a whole bottle of red wine) around his Papal Tiara. I learned the following year that every costume was inspired, brilliant and award-winning. 

The following month, the boys were invited to our house for our big Thanksgiving party. They were obligated to make an appearance at Dave’s mom’s house but said they’d try to stop by after. Nick and my brother-in-law, Steve saw their car pull in around ten o’clock that night and Nick texted them to come over for a drink. After no response, Nick took his guitar over and stood in their front yard, serenading them at the top of his lungs with “Free Bird.” It worked. They came over, and not a Thanksgiving has passed without them. Dave added his Beer Pong table to the mix the following year.

The Thanksgiving Beer Pong tournament turned into the highlight of the holiday. 

By my birthday in January the next year, Dave and Thomas were staples. It didn’t take long to learn how fun, witty and outrageous they could be. Thomas gave me my own full-bottle wine glass and Dave bought us Trader Joe’s gift cards to fill it. Every birthday and Christmas for the next fifteen years, Nick, Omar, Chloe and I unwrapped the most thoughtful gifts ever, everything carefully handpicked and wrapped with elegance. 

In 2009, I threw a big birthday party for Nick’s Fiftieth. All of his best friends were there and even his sister, Mitzi flew in. It was a blow-out. In the entertainment portion of the evening, I cut the lights, Mark opened the garage door to the opening strains of a familiar guitar lick and we finally got to witness the appearance of Victoria, Thomas’ alter-ego. She sang Winona Judd’s version of “Free Bird,” then followed it up with Tina Turner’s “Private Dancer,” complete with lap dance. No party has topped it since. 

I could go on and on, but you get the gist. But it’s not the fun and crazy times that made us family. It’s the tragic and sad times in which we’ve supported one another, grieved together and bolstered one another up. Dave lost his dad, Thomas lost his mom, our dear Russell passed. Dave’s sister died way too young. We lost our beloved Terrier Clifford and were invited next door to lie with Mama Dog before the vet came to send her peacefully to doggie heaven. Dave and Thomas were here when Nick’s dad had a stroke at our house and helped out when my mom broke her leg while visiting. They’ve covered when we’ve travelled to help our family members and we’ve done the same for them. They held me up through a stressful period when Omar’s brother came to live with us. Thomas bought me a little hamster sipper bottle and hung it on the gate between our houses. He filled it with wine and told me to come over any time and (here he did an impression of a little rodent on its hind legs, little paws at his chest, drawing noisily on the bottle.) 

The week after Dave’s dad passed, I made him and Thomas come over for a get-together to get his mind off his sorrow. A night of much-needed cutting loose ensued. Thomas poured twelve-ounce glasses of wine all night and Dave made up rude nicknames for every guest. Nick was The Asshole, Mark was Neil Diamond, Gene was The Racist and Griff’s name was so rude, I can’t say it here. I didn’t get a nickname because I went to bed as usual, but I could hear the guys at the patio table right outside my bedroom window exploding with laughter. When I woke up the next morning, fourteen empty wine bottles sat lined up on the dining table. That night is hereafter known as The Fourteen Bottle Night and when any of us on the compound go through a loss, another is suggested.

Dave and Thomas have survived the thirty-year-old washer and dryer outside on their patio, the chaos of having their garage torn down…

and a pool built…

…the mess that Captain Bill made of their tile shower enclosure (he got good reviews on Angie’s List!), the Decorating Wars with the guy who moved in across the street (turns out he’s in the business and has a huge warehouse containing massive amounts of lights and decorations for every single holiday. “Looks like the Christmas Bordello over there to me. Was the nativity in the red-light district?” Thomas said the first Christmas.) There was Hamgate (you know who you are) and the six-foot-tall blow-up Billy the Bass Christmas fish singing “I Will Survive.” Omar knocking on their front door and asking if Dave could come out and play basketball, then trash-talking like the 7^thgrader he was.

We all went on the Keto diet at the same time and traded low-carb recipes, sent yummy dishes back and forth. Thomas’ always looked like a food network work of art, fanned out on a square white dish, while mine were blobs of unidentifiable food in plastic containers.

“Here,” I’d shove a container at him through the screen door. “I hope it’s good.” 

“Bitch, you didn’t even taste it first?” He’d say, eyeing it suspiciously.

We grew even closer during Covid. When I realized the shut-down was actually going to be a thing, I instituted the Compound Circuit Training Workout. I was going to waste away without my dance class and knew I needed accountability to stay in shape. We gathered together all the equipment we could find, laid out socially-distanced stations on our patio and took turns being the leader. Karleen joined us and the shit got real. She added boxing and other torturous exercises to the mix.

We all became a real pod and, along with the three other friends willing to be in the same room with us, survived 2020 together, working out, having dinner parties, staying sane. 

In January this year, we realized the real estate marked in Los Angeles was at its peak and it was time to sell. We were so scared to tell Dave and Thomas. I kept telling myself that the plan would surely work out for the best for them too. And sure enough, within three days, they had implemented a plan to move to Tulsa, Oklahoma where Dave’s mom’s family lived. Dave’s mom agreed to sell her house north of Los Angeles and move to Oklahoma (where she’d have lots of support) with them. Pretty soon, they decided to invite Thomas’ dad to come too. He’d been struggling and needed a big change. And Thomas wanted him close so he could keep an eye on him. They found a house in one weekend, made an offer, it was accepted immediately, they closed in a month and sold Dave’s mom’s house the day before. Thomas immediately got a teaching job for the fall. Things just fell in place for them. 

It’s hard to say good-bye. Hard to see them go. Hard to lose our next-door neighbor friendship. Of course, we’ve promised to visit, but it won’t be the same here on Pass Avenue. They will leave a big void. Dave pointed out that he’s spent a third of his life next door. Chloe was fifteen when they moved in. Omar doesn’t remember a time they weren’t in his life. I hate change. But I trusted that selling was the right move for Nick and me. I trusted that it would be the right move for Dave and Thomas. So I need to trust that, yes, it’s the end of an era, but our friendship will morph into a new friendship for a new era.