...and the older I get, the more I understand Thomas Wolfe

On the heels of spending about 14 days out in California (10 of which were in downtown Los Angeles at a work-related event), I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s a lot to the old Thomas Wolfe title “You Can’t Go Home Again.” I mean, I suspect you can always go back to your hometown, the question is how much of it is going to resemble the place you grew up and more importantly, how many of the people are going to still be around once you get there.

 

Though there are certainly some things that appeared to remain the same, the fact is that an awful lot has changed since I left Los Angeles about 9 years ago…especially in the downtown area where the event was held. Sure there were some things that were the same…but for the most part…it just didn’t’ seem like the place I spent the first four decades of my life. Perhaps even more striking is the fact that many of the people…just aren't there anymore.

The host hotel (the JW Marriott) where we stayed wasn’t there when I moved back east in early 2005…but it certainly was a pretty nice place to hold up for 10 days in the unfortunate event that you have to spend that much time in downtown Los Angeles.  My corner perch on the 18^th floor offered a bird’s eye view that was like a snapshot of my life…or at least part of it. Out the window to the left was the Good Samaritan hospital where I was born in 1961 (it was also where several of my North Dakota ancestors worked when they first migrated to California in the 1940s). Through the glass in the distance straight east were the lights of Dodger Stadium…where I spent so many days and nights rooting for my beloved Dodgers. Looking down to the right on the east side of the 110 freeway, I could see many high rise buildings where I worked for so many years as an IBEW electrician. So…at least at first glance…there were thankfully a couple of things that reminded me of home. But there were many more things that didn’t,  and while it was a memorable trip, and though there is little argument that the downtown redevelopment has made for a better city, I guess it just didn’t seem much like my city.

The convention center where we held the event brought back some old memories. Walking down the cavernous halls on my daily 20 mile (OK…it was really only about 18 miles) morning treks from the hotel to the South convention hall made it hard not to reminisce about the many nights I spent at big union meetings in the West Hall of that complex. Man…there were some wild nights in there.

The old 24-hour Pantry restaurant where I used to eat breakfast when I was working with the tools is  still there too…and I even managed to make it over there for two artery clogging breakfasts before the insanity of the convention made off-site dining next to impossible. That was kind of sad, because had I been able to eat there all 10 days, I’m convinced I could gotten my diastolic blood pressure up well north of 200 (not a big lift when it’s already at 190). But  again, while there were certainly some things that triggered old memories, there seemed to be so many more newer places that had me wondering where the old town, and many of the old people had gone.

Once the convention was over, I was yearning for more familiar turf so I met my old buddy Chuck for breakfast over on the Westside in the old neighborhood. I was supposed to meet him at 8:00am, but after leaving the hotel at 7:10am, it took me 90 minutes to travel the five miles down the westbound 10. It made me fondly recall the old freeway shooting craze that gripped the area many years ago, and had my Enterprise rental Yukon come with a gun rack and a Winchester 30/30 lever action, I would have resurrected the practice and happily rid the world of a few more idiots while making my way past the Western, Arlington, Crenshaw, La Brea, Fairfax and La Cienega off ramps before reaching my destination on Robertson.  

I hadn’t allotted that much travel time to go five miles, because when I was a kid, traveling west towards Santa Monica on the 10 (west of downtown) was against the rush hour traffic pouring east into the city. Now…with the construction of new piece of the metro rail system (they call it “Expo” something I think) serving the westside, Chuck informed me that traffic heading the opposite direction of the old commuting flow is a nightmare almost all the time.  

Even Chuck isn’t the same, having dropped something like 44lbs on Weight Watchers. He probably noticed I’ve changed too, as I’ve been doing Weight Watchers as well. Recently, I’ve watched my weight climb from about 195 up to 215. We met at a place called “Old Goats” (or something like that) and though it’s apparently been there for a while…I didn’t remember it either. Though the diner sat in the middle of the old hood...I didn't recognize a soul in the place. 

 

Once outside  I glanced around the businesses on Pico Blvd and while the Conroy’s open air flow shop and Stanley Holden dance studio (no…I didn’t dance...I only know that because my wife took ballet lessons there) seemed to have vanished…I was glad to see the Kentucky Fried Chicken was still on the northwest corner of Patricia Ave across from St. Timothy’s.  The Rancho Park golf course was still there too…but they’ve put a fence around it that makes it look quite different than the inviting entrance I remember it as a youngster.

I cruised by the old house at 10635 Esther Ave too, but they’ve added a second story to the 1929 Tudor so it doesn’t look much like the place I grew up. Most of the neighborhood is different now as well.  My childhood buddies Jeffrey Russell, Clayton Riddle, Keith Sylber, Michael Cooper and Billy Horning have long since moved away…and many of the older folks (Mrs. Burns, Mr & Mrs. Beerhouse, Mr. and Mrs. Ramie, Mr. Robinson, and my old Piano Teacher Mrs. Lee) passed away decades ago. Most of the houses look different as well…although there are a couple that still look pretty much the same.

Overland Avenue Elementary still looks pretty much like the public school where I attended grades 1 through 6 (over the span of 8 years) and I think the old “No Trespassing” sign on the front gate we used to climb over everything afternoon in the summer to play stickball might be the same one that was there in the 60’s and 70’s. It was weird driving by it though…as I couldn’t help but notice that the whole campus just looked smaller. I drove by my old High School on Robertson too…and thankfully…Hamilton High looked pretty much the same.

After visiting the westside, the last few days of the trip were spent up at my mom’s place in Santa Paula. My dad passed in 2006 shortly after I moved east, so I try to get up to her retirement place periodically to help her with some basic chores. I stayed pretty busy changing light bulbs, power-washing the exterior of her house, cleaning the outside windows, waxing her car (she’s 84 and still drives), fixing and oiling the garage door hinges, repairing the sliding closet doors and working on the automatic sprinklers. But even with all that work, it was always nice to wrap up about 3:30 each afternoon with a cigar on the patio before heading in to shower so I could drive her to dinner by 4:30 in the afternoon (we ate at 3 different nice restaurants and were the first ones seated).  

My mom would come outside and sit while I decompressed and exhaled carcinogens into the pacific breeze.  As we sat there visiting, much of our afternoon conversation was about all the people and relatives that aren’t here anymore. When I was a kid, these folks seemed like giants, and after surviving the Depression and at least one world war, I was certain they would be around forever. Uncle Ted (he was at Pearl when the bombs dropped), aunt Helen,  aunts Nanny and Selma, uncle George and aunt Marie, Grandpa Nelson, aunt Mary and uncle Fred, uncle Donald, cousins; Alice, Pam, Martin (was a tailgunner on a bomber over France), Paul, Helen, Roy, Bob, Bill have all passed on…and that is only naming a few.

After supper in the evenings my mom and I would sit around signing old hymns while I strummed the Tenor Uke. She still sings a pretty good alto, and we’d  harmonize many of her favorites like “How Great Thou Art," "Amazing Grace and “The Old Rugged Cross,” and usually even a chorus or two of “Home on the Range” or “The Red River Valley.”  When we finished we’d usually spend a few minutes talking about how good we sounded…but often the conversation would drift back to more reminiscing about old times and additional friends and family in California and North Dakota that aren’t here anymore. That topic got my mom to speculating about heaven, and her hope that there really is something to the promise of seeing loved ones in a mansion on a hilltop with streets paved of gold.

What’s the point of all this? Well, if you’ve visited this site or read this blog before, you probably already know there isn’t much in the way of a well-organized thought. More than anything, it’s really all I could muster up in the four o’clock hour on an early Friday morning in mid-September.  

But perhaps if you’re younger, let’s say under age forty, you might just want to think for 10 seconds about all places and people around you that you presume will be here forever.  Some of the places will undoubtedly stand the test of time, but unless something changes, most of the people probably won’t and ultimately neither will you. I never thought about that at all when I was younger, and you probably don’t want to think about it either. But sometime around age 50, when I realized more was behind me than ahead,  it hit me like a ton of bricks.

There’s no doubt it’s at least somewhat depressing, but if I was you I wouldn’t avoid it because you’re counting on some big reunion in the clouds (or in my case, a coal shoveling party in the furnaces down below). If nothing else, maybe this will cause you to reflect on the inevitability of your own mortality a bit, and if that encourages you to email an uncle or text an old friend, it will have all been worth the otherwise directionless keystrokes. Heck…if you still can, you might even end up picking up the cell and calling your mom or dad.

Have a great weekend…and if at all possible, have the clarity to push aside the stuff that belongs at the bottom of the pile and do something that matters with the people and pets that you love. If you can, spend the time like you know things will eventually change…and treat each interaction like you understand the people you care about (and you) are only on this planet for a finite amount of time. 

Like a blind dog without a bone...