Forever Home – July 31st

I moved to Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley (or just “The Valley”) almost 40 years ago, and I’ve lived almost 35 of those 40 years in two houses that are within a mile of each other. I know those areas and streets like the back of my hand, and that’s a long, long time. Today I drove away.

I understand that I’ll be back, occasionally, infrequently, as the desire and requirements arise to visit the office or to visit old friends or collect mail from the PO Box that we’ve had for 35+ years (and still have). But on a daily basis, going to one of those two houses? Nope, today was it. The last of all of the “stuff” is out and at the new Forever Home.

You know, if I didn’t have almost 70 years of accumulated CRAP stored, you could almost fit two cars in there!

In an almost perfectly orchestrated “LA Moment” as I was stuck in horrible, dragging, pathetically slow traffic on the freeway, I was listening to “JACK-FM” on the radio. I used to listen to it all the time, but it’s been years now since I’ve tuned it in since I almost always am listening instead to SiriusXM satellite radio. But the moving vans have only AM or FM, so JACK was the best option. Then, Peter Schilling’s “Major Tom” comes on and I’ve got it cranked to the max. I’ve got the windows rolled up and I’m on the freeway at a standstill so who could it be bothering? 😇Suddenly, as we get to the first chorus, where the countdown comes in, I see the guy in front of me in a covertible Mercedes hold up his arm and in perfect synchronicity, stick up his fingers “FOUR!” “THREE!” “TWO!” “ONE!” “Earth below us / Drifting, falling…” I was doing it too (of course!) but quickly rolled down the window and stuck my arm out for the second chorus. It was perfect!

About 45 minutes later, while I was still stuck in traffic in a 15′ boat anchor somewhere around Pasadena, we got treated to Genesis’ “In The Air Tonight.” Still on incredibly loud. I’m guessing that my drop-top Mercedes friend was halfway to Las Vegas by that point, but I want to believe (nay, I HAVE TO BELIEVE) that we were still kindred spirits at the 3:40 solo drum break, pounding on our respective steering wheels like brothers from different mothers.

It was an LA sortof thing. Adios!