Again she told me how nice it was to finally meet me ('again' because we had the same conversation last time I visited). Enthusiastically the woman went on about how highly my father spoke of me. Her late husband had been an LAPD officer and they had known my father since he was 16. What are the odds? Anyway, as she went on about what a gentleman my father was and how he loved my mother and called her his "little English wife", she started to vary from the tale I'd heard before.
Mentioning La Canada, where she still had a house, prompted her to divulge that, in a hushed voice, she couldn't go back, however much she wanted to, because of the dangerous neighbor. As we sat talking at the table, Dad's usual table partner quietly left to sit by the piano, saving his girl a seat so she could join him later. She continued to tell me in a low voice how a Jewish man had moved in to the house next to hers. She said that "they" put up a good surface appearance, but that he was dangerous. He had tried on many occasions to kill her with his car. She had even gone to the police station to report him; but he was tricky. Her daughter decided it was too dangerous for her to continue to live there, so she found this place as a temporary solution.
I said that her daughter must be very concerned with her safety to have moved her here, and it was important that she stay safe here. As this well-spoken woman went to join her boyfriend (does she know he is also Jewish?), I wondered about the brain and how it creates parallel realities. I thought of her daughter getting a call from the police station about her hysterical mother, and the decision made to move her to a care facility. My father has told residents and workers that the dog in the lobby painting is Ginger, my childhood dog, and sometimes that my sister owns the building and I am the Principal of a school. Perhaps all of the pattern-seeking brain activity that has gone on all our lives takes the side streets as we age, making sense of the strange neighborhoods we find ourselves in.
I sat at in the car thinking about this woman and her stories and I wondered how much truth there was stirred into the cauldron of her tales. There are over a hundred residents in this place, each with stories to tell. Fantastic, semi-truthful, historical, personal stories. What a treasure box of fables! A book could be written about the secrets, dramas, love stories, and mysteries swirling around the halls and dining rooms of this neighborhood aging care facility. I'd better get started...
